Microsoft: Russian state hackers are using IoT devices to breach enterprise networks

One of Russia's elite state-sponsored hacking groups is going after IoT devices as a way to breach corporate networks, from where they pivot to other more high-value targets.Attacks have been observed in the wild said the Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center, one of the OS maker's cyber-security divisions.The OS maker attributed the attacks to a group it calls Strontium, but is also commonly known as APT28 or Fancy Bear.This group has been previously involved in the DNC hack of 2016, and which, acording to an indictment filed in 2018 by US officials, has been identified as Unit 26165 and Unit 74455 of the Russian military intelligence agency GRU. Microsoft said that in April this year, its staff spotted Strontium attempting "to compromise popular IoT devices across multiple customer locations."The hacker group tried to exploit a VOIP phone, an office printer, and a video decoder, Microsoft said."The investigation uncovered that an actor had used these devices to gain initial access to corporate networks," the Redmond-based company said. "In two of the cases, the passwords for the devices were deployed without changing the default manufacturer's passwords and in the third instance the latest security update had not been applied to the device."

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Securing Real-world IoT Applications through Penetration Testing

Article | July 5, 2023

Enhancing IoT security: Unveiling the significance of penetration testing in securing real-world IoT applications, identifying vulnerabilities, and mitigating risks for the protection of IoT data. Contents 1. Introduction to IoT Application Security and Penetration Testing 1.1 Vulnerabilities of IoT application security 2. Fundamentals of IoT Penetration Testing 3. Considerations for IoT Penetration Testing 4. Methodologies and Approaches for IoT Penetration Testing 5. Takeaway 1. Introduction to IoT Application Security and Penetration Testing Securing real-world IoT applications is paramount as the Internet of Things (IoT) permeates various aspects of any individuals lives. Penetration testing serves as a vital tool in identifying vulnerabilities and assessing the resilience of IoT systems against cyber threats. In this article, delve into the significance of penetration testing in securing IoT applications, exploring its role in identifying weaknesses, mitigating risks, and ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of IoT data. 1.1 Vulnerabilities of IoT application security Expanded Attack Surface: The proliferation of IoT devices has dramatically expanded the attack surface, increasing the potential for security breach enterprise networks. With billions of interconnected devices, each presenting a potential vulnerability, the risk of unauthorized access, data breaches, and other security incidents is significantly heightened. Risks: IoT devices often possess limited computational resources, making them susceptible to software and firmware vulnerabilities. Their resource-constrained nature can limit the implementation of robust security measures, leaving them exposed to potential attacks. Furthermore, a significant concern is the prevalence of default or weak credentials on these devices. Diverse Threat Landscape: The threat landscape surrounding IoT devices is extensive and ever-evolving. It encompasses various attack vectors, including malware, botnets, DDoS attacks, physical tampering, and data privacy breaches. One notable example is the Mirai botnet, which compromised a vast number of IoT devices to launch large-scale DDoS attacks, leading to significant disruptions in internet services. In addition, IoT devices can serve as entry points for infiltrating larger networks and systems, allowing attackers to pivot and gain control over critical infrastructure. Botnets: IoT devices can be infected with malware and become part of a botnet, which can be used for various malicious activities. Botnets are often utilized to launch distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, where a network of compromised devices overwhelms a target system with traffic, causing it to become inaccessible. Ransomware: IoT devices are also vulnerable to ransomware attacks. Ransomware is malicious software that encrypts the data on a device and demands a ransom payment in exchange for the decryption key. Data Breaches: IoT devices can be targeted to steal sensitive data, including personal identifiable information (PII) or financial data. Due to inadequate security measures, such as weak authentication or unencrypted data transmissions, attackers can exploit IoT devices as entry points to gain unauthorized access to networks and systems. 2. Fundamentals of IoT Penetration Testing IoT penetration testing, also known as ethical hacking or security assessment, is a critical process for testing and identifying vulnerabilities and assessing the security posture of IoT devices, networks, and applications. It involves simulating real-world attacks to uncover weaknesses and provide insights for remediation. IoT penetration testing involves identifying vulnerabilities, conducting targeted attacks, and evaluating the effectiveness of security controls in IoT systems. IoT pen-testing aims to proactively identify and address potential weaknesses that malicious actors could exploit. The methodology of IoT pen-testing typically follows a structured approach. It begins with attack surface mapping, which involves identifying all potential entry and exit points that an attacker could leverage within the IoT solution. This step is crucial for understanding the system's architecture and potential vulnerabilities. Pentesters spend considerable time gathering information, studying device documentation, analyzing communication protocols, and assessing the device's hardware and software components. Once the attack surface is mapped, the following steps involve vulnerability identification and exploitation. This includes conducting security tests, exploiting vulnerabilities, and evaluating the system's resilience to attacks. The penetration testers simulate real-world attack scenarios to assess the device's ability to withstand threats. After exploitation, post-exploitation activities are performed to determine the extent of the compromise and evaluate the potential impact on the device and the overall IoT ecosystem. Finally, a detailed technical report summarizes the findings, vulnerabilities, and recommendations for improving the device's security. 3. Considerations for IoT Penetration Testing Fuzzing and Protocol Reverse Engineering: Employ advanced techniques like fuzzing to identify vulnerabilities in communication protocols used by IoT devices. Fuzzing involves sending malformed or unexpected data to inputs and analyzing the system's response to uncover potential weaknesses. Radio Frequency (RF) Analysis: Perform RF analysis to identify weaknesses in wireless communication between IoT devices. This includes analyzing RF signals, monitoring wireless communication protocols, and identifying potential vulnerabilities such as replay attacks or unauthorized signal interception. Red Team Exercises: Conduct red team exercises to simulate real-world attack scenarios and evaluate the organization's detection and response capabilities. Red team exercises go beyond traditional penetration testing by emulating the actions and techniques of skilled attackers. This helps uncover any weaknesses in incident response, detection, and mitigation processes related to IoT security incidents. Embedded System Analysis: Gain expertise in analyzing and reverse engineering embedded systems commonly found in IoT devices. This includes understanding microcontrollers, debugging interfaces, firmware extraction techniques, and analyzing the device's hardware architecture. Embedded system analysis helps identify low-level vulnerabilities and potential attack vectors. Zero-Day Vulnerability Research: Engage in zero-day vulnerability research to identify previously unknown vulnerabilities in IoT devices and associated software. This requires advanced skills in vulnerability discovery, exploit development, and the ability to responsibly disclose vulnerabilities to vendors. 4. Methodologies and Approaches for IoT Penetration Testing Mobile, Web and Cloud Application Testing Mobile, web, and cloud application testing is integral to IoT penetration testing, focusing on assessing the security of applications that interact with IoT devices. This methodology involves various steps to evaluate the security of these applications across different platforms. For mobile applications, the methodology includes reviewing the binary code, conducting reverse engineering to understand the inner workings, and analyzing the file system structure. Sensitive information such as keys and certificates embedded within the mobile app are scrutinized for secure storage and handling. The assessment extends to examining the application's resistance to unauthorized modifications. In web applications, the testing covers common vulnerabilities like cross-site scripting (XSS), insecure direct object references (IDOR), and injection attacks. Application reversing techniques are employed to gain insights into the application's logic and potential vulnerabilities. Additionally, hardcoded API keys are identified and assessed for their security implications. Firmware Penetration Testing Firmware penetration testing is a crucial aspect of IoT security assessments, aiming to identify vulnerabilities within the firmware running on IoT devices. The methodology encompasses multiple steps to uncover weaknesses. The process begins with binary analysis, dissecting the firmware to understand its structure, functionality, and potential vulnerabilities. Reverse engineering techniques are applied to gain deeper insights into the firmware's inner workings, exposing potential weaknesses like hardcoded credentials or hidden functionality. The analysis extends to examining different file systems used in the firmware and evaluating their configurations and permissions. Sensitive keys, certificates, and cryptographic material embedded within the firmware are scrutinized for secure generation, storage, and utilization. Additionally, the resistance of the firmware to unauthorized modification is assessed, including integrity checks, secure boot mechanisms, and firmware update processes. IoT Device Hardware Pentest IoT device hardware penetration testing involves a systematic methodology to assess the security of IoT devices at the hardware level. This comprehensive approach aims to identify vulnerabilities and weaknesses that attackers could exploit. The methodology includes analyzing internal communication protocols like UART, I2C, and SPI to understand potential attack vectors. Open ports are examined to evaluate the security controls and risks associated with communication interfaces. The JTAG debugging interface is explored to gain low-level access and assess the device's resistance to unauthorized access. Extracting firmware from EEPROM or FLASH memory allows testers to analyze the code, configurations, and security controls. Physical tampering attempts are made to evaluate the effectiveness of the device's physical security measures. 5. Takeaway Penetration testing is crucial in securing real-world IoT applications, enabling organizations to identify vulnerabilities and mitigate risks effectively. By conducting comprehensive and regular penetration tests, organizations can proactively identify and address security weaknesses, ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of IoT data. With the ever-growing threat landscape and increasing reliance on IoT technologies, penetration testing has become indispensable to safeguard IoT applications and protect against potential cyber-attacks. Several key factors will shape the future of IoT penetration testing. First, the increasing complexity of IoT systems will require testing methodologies to adapt and assess intricate architectures, diverse protocols, and a wide range of devices. Second, there will be a greater emphasis on security by design, with penetration testing focusing on verifying secure coding practices, robust access controls, and secure communication protocols. Third, supply chain security will become crucial, necessitating penetration testing to assess the security measures implemented by vendors, third-party components, and firmware updates. Fourth, integrating IoT penetration testing with DevSecOps practices will ensure continuous monitoring and improvement of IoT system security. Lastly, as attackers become more sophisticated, future IoT penetration testing methodologies will need to keep pace with evolving IoT-specific attack techniques. By embracing these advancements, IoT penetration testing will play a vital role in ensuring the security and privacy of IoT deployments.

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IoT Security

How to Secure Your Network with Zero Trust Security for IoT?

Article | October 11, 2023

The concept of "never trust, always verify" is the foundation of the relatively new security architecture known as "zero trust." Zero trust requires that all users and devices be verified every time they connect, even from inside the "moat," in contrast to the conventional castle-and-moat security architecture, which automatically trusts users and devices located within a network's perimeter. Companies are being forced to reconsider how they safeguard their networks by the internet of things (IoT). Unmanaged smart gadgets connected to the internet expand the number of potential access points for hackers to compromise your security when they are added to a network. Zero Trust Security Expansion for IoT After establishing it for users and their devices, organizations must extend zero-trust security to cover unmanaged, non-user devices too. To do this, they require zero trust identity management technologies that automatically register devices, issue credentials, and offer password-less authentication. Device Visibility A device may be infected with malware or have a security breach if performance problems or bugs start to appear frequently. In addition, a malfunctioning device may be more vulnerable to attack. Therefore, organizations require device health monitoring that can automatically identify problems and flag them for remedy in order to establish and maintain zero trust security for IoT. Some cutting-edge solutions can also automatically prevent an impacted device from making further connection attempts or carrying out corrective actions without requiring human participation. The Principle of Least Privilege (PoLP) The principle of least privilege (PoLP), which argues that any user or device should only obtain the bare minimum access privileges necessary to perform their job functions, is widely used in conjunction with zero trust security. Therefore, organizations must establish the minimal level of network access required for each device to carry out its functions before limiting its potential privileges in order to deploy PoLP for IoT. Implementing identity and access management (IAM) tools and guidelines that support zero trust and PoLP for devices is one approach to accomplishing this. Security Monitoring There are other zero-trust security monitoring programs created especially for IoT, such as Palo Alto Networks' IoT Security, which was previously discussed. Businesses can also utilize tools to monitor devices and network traffic, such as next-generation firewalls and intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDS/IPS). The zero trust security solution for IoT must include monitoring in addition to as much automation as possible so that threats can be identified, contained, and remedied even when no one is there to press a button or disconnect a device manually. One of the leading causes of zero trust security projects failing over time is that people stop adhering to them once they get complicated. This is especially true for IoT security that operates on zero trust. In addition, it can be logistically challenging to keep remote, unmanaged devices at zero trust.

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IoT Security

Understanding IoT Data Protocols: Why Do They Matter for IoT Data?

Article | June 27, 2023

Learn more about IoT data protocols and what makes them essential for a cohesive IoT ecosystem. This article will provide a detailed view of data protocols and their importance for modern businesses. 1 Significance of IoT Data Protocols for Business Operations IoT ecosystems form an integral part of many businesses today, and IoT data protocols serve as the foundation for seamless communication and data exchange between connected devices. IoT protocols ensure the integrity and reliability of data, empowering businesses to make informed decisions, optimize operations, enhance productivity, and drive innovation. With standardized and secure IoT protocols and standards, companies can achieve efficient data transmission and allow for scalability across diverse IoT ecosystems. Understanding and leveraging the right protocols is essential for businesses to benefit from the full potential of their IoT investments and gain a competitive edge in today's interconnected world. 2 Understanding IoT Data Protocols IoT data protocols are standardized rules and formats that ensure efficient and secure data transmission for efficient IoT communication. By adhering to established protocols such as MQTT, CoAP, and AMQP, businesses can maintain interoperability, scalability, and robust data transmission of IoT data, ensuring efficient data storage and management for their IoT ecosystem. This, in turn, empowers organizations to monitor and control critical processes in real-time and make informed decisions. 2.1 Role of IoT Data Protocols in the IoT Ecosystem The seamless functioning of an organization's IoT ecosystem relies on the pivotal role played by IoT data protocols. These protocols, serving as the communication backbone, enable secure transfer and efficient data processing, thereby facilitating the seamless exchange of information within the IoT network. Consequently, businesses operating within the IoT sphere can harness the power of reliable data communication enabled by these protocols to unlock insights that drive innovation. IoT data protocols serve as the vital link that fuels the interconnected landscape of IoT devices, elevating the efficiency and efficacy of businesses as they navigate the complex web of IoT technologies and leverage its immense potential. 2.2 Overview of Common IoT Data Protocols The IoT data protocols come with their own set of applications and challenges. Understanding each protocol's individual use cases will help businesses set up and scale their IoT device ecosystems. MQTT (Message Queuing Telemetry Transport): MQTT is a lightweight and efficient protocol designed for low-power devices and unreliable networks. It uses a publish-subscribe model, making it ideal for IoT applications where bandwidth and power consumption are crucial factors, such as remote monitoring and control systems. CoAP (Constrained Application Protocol): For resource-constrained IoT devices, CoAP is designed to enable smooth communication over the Internet. It uses a client-server model and is suitable for IoT applications where devices have limited processing power and memory, such as smart home automation, environmental monitoring, and healthcare systems. HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol): Although primarily designed for web applications, HTTP is also used in IoT systems for data transmission. The ubiquity and familiarity of HTTP make it a widely supported communication protocol. As a result, it is suitable for IoT devices that require high-level interoperability in applications that involve cloud integration, data analytics, and web-based control interfaces. AMQP (Advanced Message Queuing Protocol): AMQP is a flexible messaging protocol ensuring reliable, secure, and interoperable communication between IoT devices and back-end systems. It supports both publish-subscribe and point-to-point messaging models, making it suitable for IoT scenarios involving complex routing, large-scale deployments, and enterprise integrations. Zigbee: Zigbee is a wireless protocol designed specifically for low-power, short-range communication in IoT networks. It operates on the IEEE 802.15.4 standard and is known for its energy efficiency and mesh networking capabilities, leading to its widespread adoption in home automation, intelligent lighting, and industrial control systems. 3 Considerations for Choosing the Right IoT Data Protocol Selecting a suitable IoT data protocol is essential to maintain smooth interoperability and a unified IoT ecosystem. Compatibility with existing infrastructure is crucial for seamless integration and cost-effective implementation. Security measures must also be robust to protect sensitive data from unauthorized access and potential breaches. Additionally, scalable and flexible data protocols in IoT are vital to accommodate future growth and evolving business requirements. Furthermore, the protocol's reliability and efficiency in transmitting data should align with the use case of IoT systems. Finally, considering the protocol's industry adoption and standardization level will also help minimize risks and enhance interoperability. 4 In Summary IoT data protocols play a significant role in facilitating efficient and secure business operations within the IoT ecosystem. By learning more about the use cases of the most common protocols in the industry, businesses can consider factors such as compatibility, security, scalability, and reliability while choosing the most suitable option for their business. As IoT systems grow, more complex and reliable data protocols will emerge, paving the way for enhanced connectivity, interoperability, and transformative opportunities across various industries.

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IoT Adoption: Before and After COVID-19

Article | April 14, 2020

The survey data I’m referring to comes from a study conducted by the Eclipse Foundation about the adoption of commercial Internet of Things (IoT) technology. The aim of the study was to get a better understanding of the IoT industry landscape by identifying the requirements, priorities, and challenges faced by organizations deploying and using commercial IoT technologies. More than 350 respondents from multiple industries responded, with about a quarter of respondents coming from industrial production businesses. While this survey was not solely focused on the manufacturing and processing industries, its results reflect the general business community’s IoT adoption at the end of 2019. As such, it is a pre-COVID-19 snapshot of IoT adoption.

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Industrial IoT

Tuya Smart Delivers IoT Best Practice Using Amazon Aurora, Leads the Direction of Cloud Database Innovation Use Cases with Amazon Web Services

Tuya Smart | January 24, 2024

Tuya Smart, the global IoT developer service provider, has delivered its Best Practices in using Amazon Aurora at IoT industry. Amazon Aurora is a relational database management system (RDBMS) built for the cloud with full MySQL and PostgreSQL compatibility. Tuya and Amazon Web Services (AWS) built a solid basis of collaboration in database use cases exploration while also delivering smooth operation of billions of devices requiring high concurrency and low latency. Tuya and AWS: Building a benchmark for database implementation practice Tuya is a leading technology company focused on making our lives smarter. Tuya does this by offering a cloud platform that connects a range of devices via the IoT. By building interconnectivity standards, Tuya bridges the intelligent needs of brands, OEMs, developers, and retail chains across a broad range of smart devices and industries. Tuya's solutions enable partners and customers by improving the value of their products while making consumers' lives more convenient through the application of technology. As of September 30, 2023, the Tuya IoT Developer Platform has accumulated over 909,000 registered developers from over 200 countries and regions, covering industries including real estate, hospitality, residential, industry, agriculture, etc. The greater the breadth of business coverage, the more advanced technological support required. Tuya faces high-frequency reads and writes as well as enormous data storage challenges from billion-level online devices. Meanwhile, due to the commercial scenarios involving smart homes and smart industries, Tuya's operating response demands low latency in order to deliver a smoother user experience. Furthermore, Tuya's quick expansion and regular business changes have posed significant challenges to its operation and maintenance management. Tuya selected Amazon Aurora as core database engine for its unparalleled performance and availability at global scale. How does Tuya specifically leverage the Amazon Aurora database? Tuya currently manages billions of real-time online devices and can keep cloud message processing response times under 10 milliseconds. However, billions online devices provide a challenge. During holidays, there will be peak traffic volume, with tens of millions of devices going online and offline virtually simultaneously. Tuya used Amazon Aurora to construct a data storage solution to solve the main problem of rapid increase in short-term traffic, and to fully utilize resources. Aurora's design, which separates compute and storage and low-latency replication functionality, improves system throughput by enhancing the effect of read-write separation. Aurora provides up to 15 read replicas, setting the groundwork for Tuya's read flexibility development. At the same time, Tuya has integrated Aurora Serverless, which includes seconds-level elastic expansion and contraction, allowing Tuya to handle extremely heavy business traffic smoothly. Tuya's customers are located throughout more than 200 nations and regions, and they deal with widespread access to IoT data. Different countries and regions have different regulations on data compliance, such as GDPR and local PII. Tuya needs to adhere to each region's data security compliance regulations. As Tuya's primary business data storage provider, Amazon Aurora was among the first in the public cloud sector to enable physical encryption for database products, which significantly decreased the cost of Tuya's security compliance transformation and gave Tuya excellent basic security guarantees. In addition, Tuya is continuously testing out additional new innovation unique to Aurora, such as Enhanced Binlog, zero-ETL, and Limitless Database. Aurora's ongoing investment in innovative technologies provides more opportunities for Tuya to expand its business. Additionally, based on Tuya's comprehensive IoT developer platform architecture, both parties have collaborated to enhance Tuya IoT applications performance indicators like stability, low latency, scalability, and security in the real-world application of databases, revealing more potential and possibilities and enabling the IoT. Tuya and AWS: Continuously promoting the evolution of cloud experience Data-driven approaches will usher in a new era of innovation in tandem with the swift advancement of data applications. At this year's re:Invent conference, Peter DeSantis, Senior Vice President of AWS, reviewed the relational database's development history in great detail. In 2014, AWS created Aurora based on log architecture. In 2018, the release of Aurora Serverless allowed for seamless scaling of database resources through virtualization technology. This year, AWS announced the launch of the Amazon Aurora Limitless Database, which automatically scales to millions of write transactions per second well beyond current limits of a single PostgreSQL instance. It is apparent from Amazon Aurora's development history that AWS has always been dedicated to innovation. Customers and partners from a range of industries actively utilizes AWS to enable rapid innovation in a variety of ways, while also working together to enhance the cloud experience. Similar to how Tuya and AWS work together, Tuya's effective and user-friendly IoT developer platform and rich and varied IoT solutions have built a significant lighthouse, embracing the Amazon Aurora's innovation and accelerated the process of building a more secure and reliable IoT database use case. Amazon Aurora VP Yan Leshinsky said, "Amazon Aurora is the fastest growing service in the history of AWS and is trusted by hundreds of thousands of customers. We innovate by working backwards from customers' needs, and we appreciate the feedback that Tuya has shared. We remain committed in developing new Aurora features and capabilities so all customers can accelerate their applications' capabilities and business growth by using Aurora." "Tuya has always committed to strengthening advanced and valuable innovations, while offering open and neutral ecosystem assistance for global partners. We provide our developers with enhanced operational and maintenance control, adaptable data storage options, superior product experience, and a global business layout by utilizing the Amazon Aurora database. We will continue to work with AWS to benefit the world in the future in areas including technology, ecosystems, and cloud computing, helping customers achieve commercial success." said Eva Na, Vice President of Marketing and Strategic Cooperation, and CMO of Tuya Smart. Enhancing the partnership with AWS, Tuya delivered IoT best practice using Amazon Aurora database, giving the industry's growth additional impetus. Tuya will maintain its open and neutral stance going forward, collaborating with cloud service providers like AWS to offer global developers a more secure, reliable, and productive cloud environment, thereby advancing the innovation and development of the entire industry.

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Enterprise Iot

Nozomi Networks Delivers Industry's First Multi-Spectrum Wireless Security Sensor for Global OT and IoT Environments

Nozomi Networks | January 25, 2024

Nozomi Networks Inc., the leader in OT and IoT security, today introduced Guardian Air™, the industry's only wireless spectrum sensor purpose-built for OT and IoT environments worldwide. With 80 percent of new IoT deployments wirelessly connected, wireless is quickly becoming a preferred network. The explosion of wirelessly connected devices increases potential access points and exploitation of networks. This puts critical infrastructure at risk of cyberattacks and disruptions to operations. Guardian Air provides much-needed visibility into wirelessly enabled devices which until now were only detected once connected to the wired network. Guardian Air monitors several prominent wireless frequencies, not just Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, to provide security teams with immediate visibility of connected sensors, devices, laptops and cell phones. With the addition of Guardian Air, customers have a comprehensive network solution all in one integrated platform. "Nozomi Networks has once again innovated to address an unmet need for wireless-level monitoring in OT and IoT environments," said Danielle VanZandt, an industry manager for commercial and public security research at Frost & Sullivan. "From smart manufacturing to digital medicine, to building automation, to modern oil field production and more, today industrial organizations are relying on billions of wireless devices to speed production and time to market. Guardian Air gives IT security professionals and OT operators the visibility they need to get a firm handle on wireless risk management and response." With Guardian Air, IT security professionals and OT operators can: Continuously monitor prominent wireless frequency technologies used in OT and IoT environments including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, cellular, LoRaWAN, Zigbee, GPS, drone RF protocols, WirelessHART and more, Immediately detect wirelessly connected assets and gain asset information to quickly address unauthorized installations, Detect wireless-specific threats, including brute force attacks, spoofing, and bluejacking – with the added ability to determine the location of the devices performing the attacks, Seamlessly integrate wireless data into a single OT & IoT security platform that unifies asset visibility from the endpoint and across wired and wireless networks. "Wireless is fundamentally changing the way industrial organizations operate. Unfortunately, it also massively expands the potential attack surface," said Nozomi Networks Co-founder and Chief Product Officer Andrea Carcano. "Guardian Air solves this problem by giving customers the accurate visibility they need at the wireless level to minimize risk while maximizing resiliency. Because Guardian Air integrates easily into the Nozomi Networks Vantage platform, customers can combine network, endpoint and wireless for the greatest visibility, threat detection and AI-powered analysis for real-time security management and remediation across the entire attack surface." The Nozomi Guardian Air wireless sensor will be available this spring from Nozomi Networks and its extensive global network of channel partners. About Nozomi Networks Nozomi Networks accelerates digital transformation by protecting the world's critical infrastructure, industrial and government organizations from cyber threats. Our solution delivers exceptional network and asset visibility, threat detection, and insights for OT and IoT environments. Customers rely on us to minimize risk and complexity while maximizing operational resilience. www.nozominetworks.com

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IoT Security

AppViewX Digital Trust Platform Named IoT Security Product of the Year

AppViewX | January 12, 2024

AppViewX, the leader in automated machine identity management (MIM) and application infrastructure security, today announced the AppViewX Digital Trust Platform has been named IoT Security Product of the Year in the 8th annual IoT Breakthrough awards program, which showcases technologies and companies that drive innovation and exemplify the best in IoT technology solutions across the globe. IoT Breakthrough is a leading market intelligence organization that recognizes the top companies, technologies and products in the global IoT market. The mission of the IoT Breakthrough Awards program is to recognize the innovators, leaders and visionaries from around the globe in a range of IoT categories, including Industrial and Enterprise IoT, Smart City technology, Connected Home and Home Automation, Connected Car, and many more. This year's program attracted nominations from companies all over the world. “Unmanaged machine identities for IoT devices can create critical security vulnerabilities, but for most organizations discovering, maintaining visibility into and controlling them has become manually unfeasible,” said Gregory Webb, CEO of AppViewX. “The AppViewX Digital Trust Platform automates IoT identity management at scale across the largest, most complex and distributed customer environments, allowing customers to achieve significantly stronger security posture and meet compliance requirements.” All IoT Breakthrough Award nominations were evaluated by an independent panel of experts within the IoT industry, with the winning products and companies selected based on a variety of criteria, including most innovative and technologically advanced products and services. About AppViewX Digital Trust Platform Out of the box, AppViewX provides instant value to customers by discovering all certificates across complex enterprise environments, building and maintaining inventories, provisioning both private and public trust certificates from any CA, alerting to expiring certificates and fully automating renewals and revocation to eliminate outages and security weaknesses across machines, applications, services, and security infrastructure. About AppViewX AppViewX is trusted by the world’s leading organizations to reduce risk, ensure compliance, and increase visibility through automated machine identity management and application infrastructure security and orchestration. The AppViewX platform provides complete certificate lifecycle management and PKI-as-a-Service using streamlined workflows to prevent outages, reduce security incidents and enable crypto-agility. Fortune 1000 companies, including six of the top ten global commercial banks, five of the top ten global media companies, and five of the top ten managed healthcare providers rely on AppViewX to automate NetOps, SecOps, and DevOps. AppViewX is headquartered in New York with offices in the U.K., Australia and three development centers of excellence in India. For more information, visit https://www.appviewx.com and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

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Industrial IoT

Tuya Smart Delivers IoT Best Practice Using Amazon Aurora, Leads the Direction of Cloud Database Innovation Use Cases with Amazon Web Services

Tuya Smart | January 24, 2024

Tuya Smart, the global IoT developer service provider, has delivered its Best Practices in using Amazon Aurora at IoT industry. Amazon Aurora is a relational database management system (RDBMS) built for the cloud with full MySQL and PostgreSQL compatibility. Tuya and Amazon Web Services (AWS) built a solid basis of collaboration in database use cases exploration while also delivering smooth operation of billions of devices requiring high concurrency and low latency. Tuya and AWS: Building a benchmark for database implementation practice Tuya is a leading technology company focused on making our lives smarter. Tuya does this by offering a cloud platform that connects a range of devices via the IoT. By building interconnectivity standards, Tuya bridges the intelligent needs of brands, OEMs, developers, and retail chains across a broad range of smart devices and industries. Tuya's solutions enable partners and customers by improving the value of their products while making consumers' lives more convenient through the application of technology. As of September 30, 2023, the Tuya IoT Developer Platform has accumulated over 909,000 registered developers from over 200 countries and regions, covering industries including real estate, hospitality, residential, industry, agriculture, etc. The greater the breadth of business coverage, the more advanced technological support required. Tuya faces high-frequency reads and writes as well as enormous data storage challenges from billion-level online devices. Meanwhile, due to the commercial scenarios involving smart homes and smart industries, Tuya's operating response demands low latency in order to deliver a smoother user experience. Furthermore, Tuya's quick expansion and regular business changes have posed significant challenges to its operation and maintenance management. Tuya selected Amazon Aurora as core database engine for its unparalleled performance and availability at global scale. How does Tuya specifically leverage the Amazon Aurora database? Tuya currently manages billions of real-time online devices and can keep cloud message processing response times under 10 milliseconds. However, billions online devices provide a challenge. During holidays, there will be peak traffic volume, with tens of millions of devices going online and offline virtually simultaneously. Tuya used Amazon Aurora to construct a data storage solution to solve the main problem of rapid increase in short-term traffic, and to fully utilize resources. Aurora's design, which separates compute and storage and low-latency replication functionality, improves system throughput by enhancing the effect of read-write separation. Aurora provides up to 15 read replicas, setting the groundwork for Tuya's read flexibility development. At the same time, Tuya has integrated Aurora Serverless, which includes seconds-level elastic expansion and contraction, allowing Tuya to handle extremely heavy business traffic smoothly. Tuya's customers are located throughout more than 200 nations and regions, and they deal with widespread access to IoT data. Different countries and regions have different regulations on data compliance, such as GDPR and local PII. Tuya needs to adhere to each region's data security compliance regulations. As Tuya's primary business data storage provider, Amazon Aurora was among the first in the public cloud sector to enable physical encryption for database products, which significantly decreased the cost of Tuya's security compliance transformation and gave Tuya excellent basic security guarantees. In addition, Tuya is continuously testing out additional new innovation unique to Aurora, such as Enhanced Binlog, zero-ETL, and Limitless Database. Aurora's ongoing investment in innovative technologies provides more opportunities for Tuya to expand its business. Additionally, based on Tuya's comprehensive IoT developer platform architecture, both parties have collaborated to enhance Tuya IoT applications performance indicators like stability, low latency, scalability, and security in the real-world application of databases, revealing more potential and possibilities and enabling the IoT. Tuya and AWS: Continuously promoting the evolution of cloud experience Data-driven approaches will usher in a new era of innovation in tandem with the swift advancement of data applications. At this year's re:Invent conference, Peter DeSantis, Senior Vice President of AWS, reviewed the relational database's development history in great detail. In 2014, AWS created Aurora based on log architecture. In 2018, the release of Aurora Serverless allowed for seamless scaling of database resources through virtualization technology. This year, AWS announced the launch of the Amazon Aurora Limitless Database, which automatically scales to millions of write transactions per second well beyond current limits of a single PostgreSQL instance. It is apparent from Amazon Aurora's development history that AWS has always been dedicated to innovation. Customers and partners from a range of industries actively utilizes AWS to enable rapid innovation in a variety of ways, while also working together to enhance the cloud experience. Similar to how Tuya and AWS work together, Tuya's effective and user-friendly IoT developer platform and rich and varied IoT solutions have built a significant lighthouse, embracing the Amazon Aurora's innovation and accelerated the process of building a more secure and reliable IoT database use case. Amazon Aurora VP Yan Leshinsky said, "Amazon Aurora is the fastest growing service in the history of AWS and is trusted by hundreds of thousands of customers. We innovate by working backwards from customers' needs, and we appreciate the feedback that Tuya has shared. We remain committed in developing new Aurora features and capabilities so all customers can accelerate their applications' capabilities and business growth by using Aurora." "Tuya has always committed to strengthening advanced and valuable innovations, while offering open and neutral ecosystem assistance for global partners. We provide our developers with enhanced operational and maintenance control, adaptable data storage options, superior product experience, and a global business layout by utilizing the Amazon Aurora database. We will continue to work with AWS to benefit the world in the future in areas including technology, ecosystems, and cloud computing, helping customers achieve commercial success." said Eva Na, Vice President of Marketing and Strategic Cooperation, and CMO of Tuya Smart. Enhancing the partnership with AWS, Tuya delivered IoT best practice using Amazon Aurora database, giving the industry's growth additional impetus. Tuya will maintain its open and neutral stance going forward, collaborating with cloud service providers like AWS to offer global developers a more secure, reliable, and productive cloud environment, thereby advancing the innovation and development of the entire industry.

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Enterprise Iot

Nozomi Networks Delivers Industry's First Multi-Spectrum Wireless Security Sensor for Global OT and IoT Environments

Nozomi Networks | January 25, 2024

Nozomi Networks Inc., the leader in OT and IoT security, today introduced Guardian Air™, the industry's only wireless spectrum sensor purpose-built for OT and IoT environments worldwide. With 80 percent of new IoT deployments wirelessly connected, wireless is quickly becoming a preferred network. The explosion of wirelessly connected devices increases potential access points and exploitation of networks. This puts critical infrastructure at risk of cyberattacks and disruptions to operations. Guardian Air provides much-needed visibility into wirelessly enabled devices which until now were only detected once connected to the wired network. Guardian Air monitors several prominent wireless frequencies, not just Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, to provide security teams with immediate visibility of connected sensors, devices, laptops and cell phones. With the addition of Guardian Air, customers have a comprehensive network solution all in one integrated platform. "Nozomi Networks has once again innovated to address an unmet need for wireless-level monitoring in OT and IoT environments," said Danielle VanZandt, an industry manager for commercial and public security research at Frost & Sullivan. "From smart manufacturing to digital medicine, to building automation, to modern oil field production and more, today industrial organizations are relying on billions of wireless devices to speed production and time to market. Guardian Air gives IT security professionals and OT operators the visibility they need to get a firm handle on wireless risk management and response." With Guardian Air, IT security professionals and OT operators can: Continuously monitor prominent wireless frequency technologies used in OT and IoT environments including Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, cellular, LoRaWAN, Zigbee, GPS, drone RF protocols, WirelessHART and more, Immediately detect wirelessly connected assets and gain asset information to quickly address unauthorized installations, Detect wireless-specific threats, including brute force attacks, spoofing, and bluejacking – with the added ability to determine the location of the devices performing the attacks, Seamlessly integrate wireless data into a single OT & IoT security platform that unifies asset visibility from the endpoint and across wired and wireless networks. "Wireless is fundamentally changing the way industrial organizations operate. Unfortunately, it also massively expands the potential attack surface," said Nozomi Networks Co-founder and Chief Product Officer Andrea Carcano. "Guardian Air solves this problem by giving customers the accurate visibility they need at the wireless level to minimize risk while maximizing resiliency. Because Guardian Air integrates easily into the Nozomi Networks Vantage platform, customers can combine network, endpoint and wireless for the greatest visibility, threat detection and AI-powered analysis for real-time security management and remediation across the entire attack surface." The Nozomi Guardian Air wireless sensor will be available this spring from Nozomi Networks and its extensive global network of channel partners. About Nozomi Networks Nozomi Networks accelerates digital transformation by protecting the world's critical infrastructure, industrial and government organizations from cyber threats. Our solution delivers exceptional network and asset visibility, threat detection, and insights for OT and IoT environments. Customers rely on us to minimize risk and complexity while maximizing operational resilience. www.nozominetworks.com

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IoT Security

AppViewX Digital Trust Platform Named IoT Security Product of the Year

AppViewX | January 12, 2024

AppViewX, the leader in automated machine identity management (MIM) and application infrastructure security, today announced the AppViewX Digital Trust Platform has been named IoT Security Product of the Year in the 8th annual IoT Breakthrough awards program, which showcases technologies and companies that drive innovation and exemplify the best in IoT technology solutions across the globe. IoT Breakthrough is a leading market intelligence organization that recognizes the top companies, technologies and products in the global IoT market. The mission of the IoT Breakthrough Awards program is to recognize the innovators, leaders and visionaries from around the globe in a range of IoT categories, including Industrial and Enterprise IoT, Smart City technology, Connected Home and Home Automation, Connected Car, and many more. This year's program attracted nominations from companies all over the world. “Unmanaged machine identities for IoT devices can create critical security vulnerabilities, but for most organizations discovering, maintaining visibility into and controlling them has become manually unfeasible,” said Gregory Webb, CEO of AppViewX. “The AppViewX Digital Trust Platform automates IoT identity management at scale across the largest, most complex and distributed customer environments, allowing customers to achieve significantly stronger security posture and meet compliance requirements.” All IoT Breakthrough Award nominations were evaluated by an independent panel of experts within the IoT industry, with the winning products and companies selected based on a variety of criteria, including most innovative and technologically advanced products and services. About AppViewX Digital Trust Platform Out of the box, AppViewX provides instant value to customers by discovering all certificates across complex enterprise environments, building and maintaining inventories, provisioning both private and public trust certificates from any CA, alerting to expiring certificates and fully automating renewals and revocation to eliminate outages and security weaknesses across machines, applications, services, and security infrastructure. About AppViewX AppViewX is trusted by the world’s leading organizations to reduce risk, ensure compliance, and increase visibility through automated machine identity management and application infrastructure security and orchestration. The AppViewX platform provides complete certificate lifecycle management and PKI-as-a-Service using streamlined workflows to prevent outages, reduce security incidents and enable crypto-agility. Fortune 1000 companies, including six of the top ten global commercial banks, five of the top ten global media companies, and five of the top ten managed healthcare providers rely on AppViewX to automate NetOps, SecOps, and DevOps. AppViewX is headquartered in New York with offices in the U.K., Australia and three development centers of excellence in India. For more information, visit https://www.appviewx.com and follow us on LinkedIn and Twitter.

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