Earlier this year Mattel unveiled “Hello Barbie,” a $74.99 wi-fi equipped interactive doll. Users press a button on Barbie’s belt to start a conversation and the recorded audio is processed over the Internet so that the doll can respond appropriately. The doll also remembers the user’s likes and dislikes. Many said that this wasn’t a good idea as the kids who were having conversations with “Hello Barbie” wouldn’t be having private conversations because someone could hack in and eavesdrop on those conversations.
Well, it seems the hacking part was accurate.
Security Researcher Matt Jakubowski claims that he has managed to hack the Hello Barbie system to extract wi-fi network names, account IDs and MP3 files, which could be used to track down someone’s home.
“You can take that information and find out a person’s house or business. It’s just a matter of time until we are able to replace their servers with ours and have her say anything we want,”
Mattel partnered with a company named ToyTalk to develop “Hello Barbie.” ToyTalk CEO Oren Jacob said this:
“An enthusiastic researcher has reported finding some device data and called that a hack. While the path that the researcher used to find that data is not obvious and not user-friendly, it is important to note that all that information was already directly available to Hello Barbie customers through the Hello Barbie Companion App. No user data, no Barbie content, and no major security or privacy protections have been compromised to our knowledge.”
So they aren’t denying the hack. Instead they’re trying to downplay the hack.
#fail
Why? Simple. Mr. Jacob has basically baited every single hacker on Earth to pwn Barbie. And trust me, that will happen. This is about to become a massive nightmare for Mattel and ToyTalk when….. And it’s not if, but when… some hacker does something really bad that affects kids in a negative way. Mattel and ToyTalk need to say and more importantly do something far more robust before the inevitable happens.
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This entry was posted on November 29, 2015 at 7:55 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags Hacked. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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Barbie Hacked To Spy On Kids
Earlier this year Mattel unveiled “Hello Barbie,” a $74.99 wi-fi equipped interactive doll. Users press a button on Barbie’s belt to start a conversation and the recorded audio is processed over the Internet so that the doll can respond appropriately. The doll also remembers the user’s likes and dislikes. Many said that this wasn’t a good idea as the kids who were having conversations with “Hello Barbie” wouldn’t be having private conversations because someone could hack in and eavesdrop on those conversations.
Well, it seems the hacking part was accurate.
Security Researcher Matt Jakubowski claims that he has managed to hack the Hello Barbie system to extract wi-fi network names, account IDs and MP3 files, which could be used to track down someone’s home.
“You can take that information and find out a person’s house or business. It’s just a matter of time until we are able to replace their servers with ours and have her say anything we want,”
Mattel partnered with a company named ToyTalk to develop “Hello Barbie.” ToyTalk CEO Oren Jacob said this:
“An enthusiastic researcher has reported finding some device data and called that a hack. While the path that the researcher used to find that data is not obvious and not user-friendly, it is important to note that all that information was already directly available to Hello Barbie customers through the Hello Barbie Companion App. No user data, no Barbie content, and no major security or privacy protections have been compromised to our knowledge.”
So they aren’t denying the hack. Instead they’re trying to downplay the hack.
#fail
Why? Simple. Mr. Jacob has basically baited every single hacker on Earth to pwn Barbie. And trust me, that will happen. This is about to become a massive nightmare for Mattel and ToyTalk when….. And it’s not if, but when… some hacker does something really bad that affects kids in a negative way. Mattel and ToyTalk need to say and more importantly do something far more robust before the inevitable happens.
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This entry was posted on November 29, 2015 at 7:55 pm and is filed under Commentary with tags Hacked. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.