Nt1310 Unit 1 Term Paper

In this section we investigate attacks and threats to our primary devices. These attacks and threats are built off of the vulnerabilities the previous section and help to determine which security controls would be most valuable against future attacks.

Healthcare

Vulnerabilities can and will be used by attackers if activity tracking devices, insulin pumps, pacemakers, and other medical devices if they are not corrected by manufacturers. Attacks on healthcare IoT devices exposes the user to theft of their PHI and may potentially put the user’s life at risk. Given the device vulnerabilities discussed in the healthcare portion of section VI, attacks and threats must be analyzed to fully recognize the need to secure IoT devices in the healthcare

domain.
Activity tracking devices such as the Fitbit Surge connects with a cellphone over a BLE connection. When a BLE connection is intercepted, an attacker is able to view encrypted and unencrypted data being shared between devices. Attackers can manipulate the data shared between devices, monitor the connection, and inject code on the device. The latter is the most concerning. When code is injected on the Fitbit, it stores and broadcasts the code to the cell phone or computer it is connected to [14]. This means an attacker can inject malicious code onto a Fitbit Surge and when that device connects to other devices the malicious code is delivered. Attackers can also share intercepted personal data with third parties. This can be done with MAC address spoofing in a MITM attack.
Physician programmers operate in a physician’s office or an operating room.

These programmers communicate with the pacemaker via wireless radio frequency as well as telemetry to make device adjustments and monitor device functions. Physician programmers require no authentication to program pacemaker devices [15]. This is true for all pacemakers. The lack of required authentication is a point of concern because of the potential for risk. As was mentioned, pacemaker manufacturers warn of prolonged exposure to cellphones, metal detection systems, and other electrical devices for risk of misinterpretation by the pacemaker. The electrical impulses these devices emit could be read by the pacemaker as a heartbeat which could cause the device to malfunction or fail [17]. Deliberate attacks on pacemakers have been tested and provide troubling results. Within a 50-foot proximity, an attacker can deliver a lethal 830v jolt to a user’s heart from a laptop [13]. On the hard drives of two pacemaker devices both encrypted and unencrypted data was found by researchers for the technology research company WhiteScope. The researchers found that one unnamed pacemaker device stores unencrypted PHI such as patient and physician names, treatment data, and, most concerning, patient social security number [15]. This information can be collected and sold through black market

vendors.
Commerce
The vulnerabilities stated in section IV are inductive to a vast amount of attack vectors. Each device and application has attack vectors that may cause damage to either just the device or a systems entirety. RFID tags are a fantastic example of an instance where the system itself could become corrupted. In a multi RFID system the tags could be attacked through active jamming, destruction, disabling, and kill commands [32]. Active jamming acts on the console access vulnerability and is activated by using a similar signal as the chip to interfere with the RFID’s host signals. This can result in loss of data transfers as well as the shutdown of the network as no data can be processed or received. Disabling can also work this way but rather through the physical layer by covering or blocking the signals with a makeshift faraday cage such as aluminum foil [32]. These two attacks are only temporary and can be used only for a limited time.
Destruction and kill command attacks on the other hand are permanent and are dependent on memory corruption and physical vulnerabilities. Destruction is what the definition entails, the device is destroyed through mishandling or purposefully applied force to break the object. This results in unrecoverable data and monetary losses. These same vulnerabilities are at risk when manufacturers have pre-saved passwords which once submitted can permanently shut down of the tag [32]. These passwords may also be able to wipe data and other memory on the device leaving it inoperable.
WSNs are full networks of sensors connected nodes that acts similar to a computer network and broadcast it’s input data to a main server. These networks are especially vulnerable to console access, DoS, memory extraction, and SQL injections. DoS attacks are very common and can result in the shutdown of the network through data tampering and overwhelming the node. This can be accomplished through resource exhaustion, malicious high energy signals, hardware failures, application failures or software bugs [33]. Console access vulnerabilities may be exploited through a number of physical attacks such as jamming and destruction. These attacks are similar to ones on RFID devices, such as jamming. Jamming is used to disturb the information transmission of nodes by sending useless information through the same radio frequency band, while destruction is used to cause irreversible damage to the device and transfer information within the device to be extracted and misused [33].
Software attacks can occur when an attacker wants to change or corrupt the application software. Application attacks may be caused by a number of vectors such as SQL injections, where a command is sent to change the currently active software to access private information, modify and or destroy data [34]. This is dangerous as the use of the device could be adjusted to the attacker’s preferences and uses, possibly ending in data extraction, corruption, and reuse and reformat of the device for malicious operations. NFC terminals may be one of the more consumer focused devices, used for simplistic tap and go payments. NFC device vulnerabilities include console access, memory extraction, and unencrypted service. These vulnerabilities coincide to one major attack known as an NFC relay attack. In this case an attacker acts as an unknown intermediary with console access between two devices, such as an NFC terminal and a mobile phone, and forces a host NFC link between them using a fast and transparent relay channel [35]. This allows information to be relayed to the device and can be used as reader or an injection device. For a successful attack the attacker must leverage the absence of localization evidence of the NFC protocol and lack of physical security [35]. Because the data transfer between the two primary devices is often unencrypted this results in memory extraction of private payment information. This has resulted in millions of dollars in losses in years past and can still be an issue without proper hardware and software upgrades.