Millions of homeowners vulnerable to hacking, IID discovers

Residents use some of the most insecure passwords for their home WiFi connections, an IID investigation has uncovered.

Copyright: Dwayne Hards.

Our Independent Crime & Investigation Department (IID) launched its own investigation into the security of two neighbourhoods' WiFi access points within the Arun District area in a desperate attempt to keep its residents safe from cybercrime and also to educate our readers around the world on the dangers of using easy-to-guess passwords. We did this by testing all nearby routers in these two neighbourhoods. And, during our investigation, we came to the conclusion that less than 60% of homeowners were likely to have a hard-to-crack password for their WiFi routers. And, in one Littlehampton neighbourhood, we managed to access more than 60% of nearby residents' networks by using just one password. Homeowners have been urged to secure their WiFi connections ever since the introduction of the internet. However, despite this, millions of people still haven't secured their WiFi access points well enough, making them an easy target for cyber criminals, potentially nosy neighbours, and even spies.

The main security threat to our WiFi networks isn't most hackers' connection to the worldwide web via our access points but is, instead, their access to our LAN (local area network) connections — which usually contain our personal information, browsing history, online activity, and any locally connected devices' IP/MAC addresses, as well as other types of information that could help a criminal — as these can be used locally and without an ISP (internet service provider) for internal communication, providing those connected with the opportunity to try and redirect your web traffic or even take over your network and access its settings and devices. All of this sensitive information is stored locally on our WiFi routers, not the internet. Although, even if hackers only used your WAN (wider area network) connection and avoided your LAN, this would still result in a higher bill if you have a limited-bandwidth plan — which many people would not appreciate too well.

We will be providing residents with free advice on keeping their networks secure and have already recorded the relevant information on both our LCN and IID systems. This should be done within the next few months but may be delayed due to public interest, legal, or ethical reasons.