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Researchers Find Method To Own VoIP Phones, Silently Listen To Any Call
Trailrunner7 writes: Researchers have uncovered a simple method for compromising some common VoIP phones, enabling them to listen to victims' calls covertly or use the phones to make expensive or fraudulent calls. The attack takes advantage of the fact that the affected phones don't have any authentication set up by default, but do have a vulnerability that is open to remote exploitation. A victim who has one of the vulnerable phones connected to a network and uses a PC on that network to visit a malicious site can be open to the attack. Paul Moore, a security consultant in the U.K., detailed the problem and demonstrated an attack on a Snom 320, a popular VOIP phone.
Secure providers of business VoIP phone service should be considered for businesses looking to avoid vulnerable VoIP systems.
Using VOIP hardware has risks and then conducting sensitive commercial or political discussions may not always be wise.
Use VOIP to talk about any product, service or policy thats out in public.
Keep sensitive discussions face to face. It might take a few hours or a 5 day round trip but it will be a bit more secure.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
"A victim who has one of the vulnerable phones connected to a network and uses a PC on that network to visit a malicious site can be open to the attack."
What desktop Operating System does this exploit run on?
so....don't use VoIP for anything.
Hilarious: the web page says "Thank you for choosing Snom! German engineered!"
I'm pretty sure that VW proved that "German Engineering" didn't mean much.
This. It's not really a voip exploit as it's just logging into a voip phone with no authentication and initiating a call. The actual exploit is getting control of the users' pc and using it to find and get into the phone. You could use the same method to get into any other device on the network, or to get the PC itself to use its mic to record stuff. This is more an indictment on the OS being compromised than the phones
That's pretty much all we get from most of these "security experts". At no point do they "take over the phone" and at no point is it, in fact, covert. The phone is clearly in use the whole time. If you were making that skype call with the f'ing phone on your desk, you'd instantly know someone is dicking with it. (as you would also by simply looking at it) Yes, someone can make the phone do, well, what the phone is designed to do via the web api. As for all this OMG-firmware-upload!!!!!11!, the images are signed and THE PHONE WILL REBOOT after being sent the firmware update command.
This is just more bullshit from internet security trolls hellbent on making every g** d*** thing so freakin' complex to use that we'll have to resort to using The One Password(tm) that can meet their idiotic requirements that's so hard to remember it'll have to be tattooed to the back of your hand. Or use a password manager, because putting all your eggs in one place is SOOOOOOOOOOO secure.
(Yes, there have been real bugs in VoIP phones that do, in fact, allow covert snooping. Sneak your own app into a Cisco phone that tunnels the mic to wherever; you'd have to watch network to know it's there.)
If an intruder has physical access to your damn network, you have a LOT more to worry about than VOIP/SIP calls they might be sniffing.
Sig for hire.
Narrator: A major one.
This sort of seems like common sense to me... not really sure that this is newsworthy...
The thing is, a lot of RTP streams are unencrypted anyway and can easily be slurped up by any packet sniffer.... right?
So, equally newsworthy would be a headline that states that open wifi hotspot maintainers can listen in on your phone calls...
My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.