Security Testing of
IoT Devices / IIoT Devices
IoT pentesting service aims to detect vulnerabilities on devices and software by methods such as firmware analysis, reverse engineering, dynamic/static analysis, application penetration testing, and IoT hardware penetration testing.
Minor mistakes that developers make within IoT software could cause vulnerabilities that will enable data loss, denial-of-service(DDoS) attacks, or facing a device compromise.
You can Request an IoT Device Security Testing to talk about our IoT pentesting service/IIoT pentesting service. Or, you can continue to reading to learn more about the security testing of IoT devices.
You can find our cybersecurity experts’ certification related to the security testing of IoT devices below. These security testing certifications show the level of accomplishment and perseverance for our work. Please check our achievements and certifications from here.
IoT Devices / IIoT Devices
Pentest Methodology of Security for Everyone
Download Sample IoT Device Security Testing Report
If you want to learn about our methodology, IoT app risks, vulnerabilities, and stuff like these, you have to scroll a bit more ;)
What makes IoT devices vulnerable to cyber-attacks?
Hackers can target IoT devices for different reasons. The first of these reasons is the use of hardware power. It’s a fact that IoT devices are designed to work on low-power systems. However, due to the number of IoT devices accessible on the internet, their hardware power can be used for cryptocurrency mining by attackers. To minimize these risks and find weak spots on the devices, it is essential to have an IoT pentesting service. Fill out S4E penetration testing form or schedule a 15 minutes initial meeting.
Another motivation can be counted as the usage of these devices' internet access. Hackers can use compromised IoT devices' internet access to remain anonymous. This may also bring legal issues for IoT devices users.
Also, hackers can access some private data and use it for blackmail. Developers of IoT devices that collect and process private data must be very careful about cybersecurity to prevent data breaches.
It’s a well-known attack method to make an IoT device a slave by using IoT-specific malware. By using malware with only a few lines of harmful code, hackers can fully control any infected IoT devices. Additionally, attackers use fully compromised IoT devices in attacks like denial of service attacks by including the devices in networks called Botnet.
Cybersecurity risks for IoT devices are as follows:
- Denial Of Services
- Data changes
- Data corruption
- Industrial theft, data hijacking
- Publication of secret information
- Physical risks (For Industrial IoT)
- Violation of privacy
- Legal problems
- Financial losses
- Unnecessary use of resources (power, internet)
If you want to read more about IoT security risks and check for a limited number of vulnerabilities for free, click here.
To minimize these risks and find weak spots on the devices, it is essential to have an IoT pentesting service. Fill out S4E penetration testing form to have a 15 minutes initial meeting.
Our IoT Pentesting Service Methodology SummarySecurity Testing of IoT Devices Methodology of Security for Everyone
1. Detection of IoT Pentesting Service Scope / Initial Meeting
We listen to your needs and exchange information to ensure that the tests will be performed in the best way possible. Thus, scope, type, and necessary information are determined in the scoping meeting. If a physical security testing of IoT devices is needed, it is decided during this meeting.
2. Information Gathering
Attack vectors on IoT devices are determined as the first thing in this step. Fundamental attack vectors on an IoT device are given below.
- Hardware
- Firmware
- Network
- Wireless Communications
- Mobile and Web Apps
- Cloud services
3. Vulnerability Assessment
Vulnerability assessment begins with firmware and application analysis. In firmware analysis, the following steps are used;
- Binary Analysis
- Reverse engineering
- Document analysis in the system(to find sensitive information or certificate)
During application analysis, all necessary application tests are performed according to the type of the application.
Then, communication protocols investigate. This stage includes the following steps;
- Determination of communication protocols (BLE, Zigbee, LoRA, 6LoWPAN)
- Sniffing, modifying, and replaying communication protocols
- Jamming based attacks
- Physical security of the device (physical damage on the device, power outage, etc.)
- Exterior USB Access
- Exterior port access
- Location and medium of storage
- Availability of debug console access
- Availability of serial console access
- Allowed connection methods (wireless, wired, Bluetooth, etc.)
After, third-party services(mobile application API services, etc.) that communicate with IoT devices determined during the information gathering step will be tested, if there are any.
As the last step of this stage, physical attack vectors are checked if the product is provided. For example;
4. Exploitation
This stage aims to exploit the collected vulnerabilities in the information gathering and vulnerability assessment sections. This way, Our customers can see the possible damage after an actual cyber attack. Also, this is the stage where risks are assessed for the vulnerabilities found. Similar vulnerabilities can have different criticality levels according to the ease of exploitation, the access to the information needed to exploit, etc.
Our cyber security experts use the necessary attack techniques without harming the systems to show what a malicious hacker can do in this step.
5. Reporting
The last step is to report all the vulnerabilities And findings to our customers. A good report must be written in a simple language, understandable by the developers, supported by screenshots, and it must be avoided to give unnecessary information.
You can download a free IoT device security testing report if you want to.
6. Regression Tests
We check the vulnerabilities in the report after our customer applied the fixes. During this regression step which we offer for free, we ensure that the vulnerabilities are entirely fixed.
Quick & Easy
IoT Devices Vulnerabilities
If you are still reading this, you might have heard about OWASP (The Open Web Application Security Project). OWASP is a non-profit foundation that works on application security. They published the ten most crucial IoT vulnerabilities working on the information they gathered from various areas on IoT vulnerabilities.
It would be beneficial to look at the list to foresee the possibilities, even though the vulnerabilities are not limited to the list below.
Guessable weak or hard-coded passwords
Using predictable, default, or embedded passwords makes your devices vulnerable to hundreds of thousands of password attacks from the internet. These types of attacks may compromise the device itself or the app running on the device.
Insecure Network Services
Unnecessarily or insecurely configured services on IoT devices would endanger data transferred on the network or processed on the device. Our cybersecurity experts detect this vulnerability by using both dynamic and static analysis.
Insecure Ecosystem Interfaces
IoT devices are designed to work at low power, and their storages are generally too small. Therefore, resource-consuming operations transfer to a remote server rather than perform on the device. Similarly, they can transfer data to other systems to work with other applications in sync. As a result, vulnerabilities in the places where your data is transferred can endanger the device itself and your data.
Lack of Secure Update Mechanism
These vulnerabilities occur when the necessary checks are not done for securely getting firmware or application updates on the IoT devices. It is crucial to ensure that the application updates receive only from secure resources using the best practices.
Use of Insecure or Outdated Components
Using unsupported software or software with vulnerabilities is another situation that endangers IoT devices. Although it is hard to develop an application or service without third-party software, misusing third-party software or without security checking could compromise the whole system.
Insufficient Privacy Protection
Lots of vulnerabilities could cause data breaches. From transmitting data securely to storing it securely and informing the users, best practices should be applied, especially when processing confidential data.
Insecure Data Transfer and Storage
Hackers may easily access the data processed by IoT by using a vulnerability from the devices or over the network. Therefore, you should use encryption properly to make accessing data as difficult as possible.
Lack of Device Management
Some IoT devices may have interfaces with minimal capacity. Or even, they may have none. This can be a problem for installing, updating, and debugging processes. During our security testing of IoT devices, our security experts add suggestions to make device management more secure.
Insecure Default Settings
As technical people, we can not expect every consumer to harden IoT devices. Services and applications must be installed with the best security settings.
Lack of Physical Hardening
There are some cybersecurity best practices to make physically accessed IoT devices much more secure. Since some IoT devices have to operate in the field, developers must consider these best practices.