The annual Pwn2Own hacking competition saw two security researchers crowned the best hackers of the year after they demonstrated and tested several high-profile hacking operations, including the attack on the Amazon Echo home help device.
Amate Kama and Richard Chow, who make up Team Fluoroacetate, received a $ 60,000 prize in the Vulnerability Rewards program after exploiting a vulnerability in the latest version of Eco, a home-based camera-assisted device that supports Amazon Digital Assistant. Alexa.
The researchers found that the device was using an older version of Chromium - Google's leading open source browser project, said Brian Gornick, director of the Zero Day initiative of Trend Micro, the information security company responsible for the competition. - A vulnerability allowed them to take full control of the device when connected via a suspicious "Wi-Fi" network.
This type of vulnerability occurs when a mathematical operation tries to create a number, but it does not have enough memory, causing the number to be out of memory, which can have security implications on the device. .
After contacting Amazon, she said, "We are investigating this research, and we will take appropriate steps to protect our devices based on our investigation," but did not specify what measures it will take to fix security vulnerabilities or when.
EcoShow was not the only device connected to the Internet at the show. Earlier this year, contestants said hackers had a chance to hack into Facebook's portal.