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Johnson & Johnson Discloses That Its Insulin Pump Is Hackable (thestack.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Stack: Johnson and Johnson has revealed that its JJ Animas OneTouch Ping insulin pump is vulnerable to hackers, who could potentially force the device to overdose diabetic patients -- however, it declares that the risk of this happening is very low. Unnamed executives from the American multinational medical manufacturer said that they were taking the unprecedented step of warning customers about the vulnerability, particularly in light of recent controversies regarding attack vectors in cardiac equipment. In a letter to doctors and 114,000 patients, sent on Monday, the company wrote: "The probability of unauthorized access to the OneTouch Ping system is extremely low... It would require technical expertise, sophisticated equipment and proximity to the pump, as the OneTouch Ping system is not connected to the internet or to any external network." Even though the company's own technicians were able to hack the pump within a distance of 25 feet, Johnson and Johnson's chief medical officer Brian Levy observed that the hack would be extremely difficult to pull off, and said "We believe the OneTouch Ping system is safe and reliable. We urge patients to stay on the product."
Now people will hack into these just to prove they can. How many have to die because of J&J being cheap and not fixing them?
If both were to come to a bad end, there would be massive rejoicing...
Although it is unlikely that a hack will occur, hopefully J&J will look at security more thoroughly in the future. Obviously a person dying due to a faulty, or hacked insulin pump is less expensive than a recall and firmware update.
Maybe they could just post equipment in major cities that hack the new firmware onto the pumps! No recall, and probability of a hack goes down even further. What on earth could possibly go wrong?!
At least the quotes don't sound like they were written by a progressive, brand visionary, user centrist methodology PR company; they've admitted that there is a problem, and it wasn't spun to say it was in the best interest of the users (take note HP).
at least they made a public disclosure.
EXACTLY.
After all, EVERYTHING is hackable.
Just don't say you weren't warned by J & J.
“The probability of unauthorized access to the OneTouch Ping system is extremely low It would require technical expertise, sophisticated equipment and proximity to the pump, as the OneTouch Ping system is not connected to the internet or to any external network.”
if someone was targeting you (especially a nation-state) and wanted to kill you, this would be a great way of doing it.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
I'm pretty sure most readers here will agree medical devices in critical applications need to be regulated and tested to a high degree. But the system was never designed around devices with internet connectivity and other communication technology. There isn't even a realistic way to upgrade the security or install patches on these devices without repeating the entire certification process in most cases. The medical community needs to update thier security in some sane and reasonable way. I mean they were almost unable to get 21st century databases (still don't in many cases) the security on devices should be the next big area to be reformed.
On one hand they are fulfilling their duty of care by disclosing this information to the public so they can make an informed decision; and
On the other hand they are protecting their shareholders by suggesting that the devices are safe and people can continue to use them.
It's a sad thing when the profit motive is put ahead of patient safety, however I suspect we will see a lot more of this as the 'Internet of Things' and 'eHealth' agendas collide on the desk of medical professionals who think they are experts but in fact are not.
Welcome to the impending risk of death by technology.
I'd like to point out, and this is refreshing, that because Johnson and Johnson disclosed this themselves, with some details, that the discussion on here is the right one. People are discussing severity, risk and impact.
Then the risk is not "extremely low". If it where that, they would just sweep their incompetence under the carpet...
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
The pump shouldn't be connected to the internet... It doesn't need to be. It probably doesn't even need Bluetooth, but probably has some sort of remote diagnostic ability so it can dump log files.... But this whole thing is moot anyway. Didn't the FDA just approve a closed-loop artificial pancreas? It looks like a good time to upgrade, and feel better!
The pump uses a proprietary protocol on 900 MHz ISM band. It is nor Bluetooth neither uses TCP/IP. So to interfere with the device one has to be in the proximity and having a system to send fake commands: it's a lot like the problems one could have with garage door openers rather than the ones with IoT things. Luckily J&J didn't followed the easy route, mabye because the pumps has to run on a small 8 bit microcontroller and adding a TCP/IP stack was unfeasible.
That is nearly 8 meter. So you only need to be in proximity doing nothing reading a book while your conspicuously hidden laptop is doing the job, with scripts already prepared is trying. Then once the max dose of insuline is given you can simply safely go. Remember that the effect will not be *immediate* has if it was cyanide administered, the blood sugar will take a bit of time to be absorbed. So yeah. The risk of being charged is actually much lower than you think it is. If nobody catch you red handed with a laptop, then once symptom start to apepar just calmly head for the exit, and wipeout your laptop.
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No. Bullshit. Not everything is hackable. Not by a long shot. And certainly not without direct physical access.
Want proof? Here's my laptop. It comes with a physical switch that turns WiFi off. Try to hack it remotely. Oh, you might be able when I turn WiFi on, true, but how about I only do that in a controlled environment, with shielded walls surrounding me and the laptop's peer so I can ensure that only these two devices communicate while WiFi is turned on, and outside the controlled environment, I turn any over-the-air connectivity off.
You're invited to hack it, but no touching!
And since the insulin pump in question is outside the body, adding such a switch is trivial at best. But I guess it would cost 5 cents more, so the markup on the device would drop to 999999999%.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Can someone explain why it even has a radio communication system? Why not just have a USB port for reprogramming?
I appreciate that wireless is convenient, but it's also a huge attack surface, and it appears that if there was any authentication at all then it's extremely weak.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
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Yes, although calling it an artificial pancreas is a lot like calling an iron lung an artificial lung. The device works in conjunction with an insulin pump and continuous glucose monitor, sampling every 5 minutes glucose levels and dosing insulin in response. It's a hybrid system though that only handles basal insulin while bolus insulin from meals needs to be manually specified, as well as periods of exercising.
The FDA specifically worked with MedTronic to accelerate the pre-market compliance testing that usually grinds development slowly.
As a type-2 diabetic, the system isn't designed for me yet, but it is exciting to see development in the area. Maybe one day I can just wear a watch like device that takes care of all my monitoring and dosing and missed injections and going hypo- or hyper-glycemic will be a thing of the past.
In fairness, adding the switch might cost five cents, but adding it to the *design* & getting it recertified would cost millions, easy.
You think that recertification will be less expensive after someone died?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
It might be honestly. Might be able to convince the FDA to agree to an accelerated process because of the emergency situation. Never let a good catastrophe go to waste...
Probabaly easier to sell the cost to stock holders and others who don't get security too when they "have to" do it, as opposed to spending just proactively suring up security that hasn't been broken yet, at least not practically for reals. Anyone in infosec knows firefighting is easier to get funding for than prevention...
Sadly this is absolutely logical and most likely correct. Thanks, now I can go home depressed...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Sadly this is absolutely logical and most likely correct. Thanks, now I can go home depressed...
Amen.
Human nature is bug in every design implementation.
Perhaps that makes it Art.