Home Router ‘Vaccinated’ by Benign, Viruses have been used to harden more than Ten thousands home routers against cyber-attacks.
Viruses are found everywhere either it is in a computer or a software or hardware or now it has also reached to the routers that are used in homes as well.
A benevolent named virus has been used to harden more than 10,000 home routers against cyber-attacks, says a security firm.
Symantec says that the Watch program is closing loopholes and fixing bugs on routers which are infected.
Criminals are increasingly targeting routers for stealing personal data or to help with large-scale web attacks.
Symantec has monitored the network of “vaccinated” devices but, so far, it has not been seen putting for malicious use.
Watch which was first discovered in late 2014 and since then it has been steadily scouring the web for routers and other smart devices running vulnerable software.
In a blog post, Symantec said that once Watch finds and infects a vulnerable router it connects to other compromised devices for downloading various software updates that make them harder to attack successfully.
Also, it is said that Wifatch tries to disinfect devices that have been compromised by malicious software. It regularly reboots devices to kill off malware’s running on them and return them to a clean state.
As far as Symantec can tell, Wifatch’s payload has no such malicious components, and the growing network of compromised devices which has never been used for attacks said Symantec security analyst Mario Ballano.
The software also leaves a message on the router telling its owner to change the default passwords and update the firmware that controls the device so that it wouldn’t get affected.
Watch targets a wide variety of home routers that run in the variations of the Linux operating system. Symantec said that “tens of thousands” of gadgets were harboring Watch. About a third of all the devices it had hit were in China with Brazil and Mexico making up another quarter of its victims.
Symantec remained cautious about the intentions of Watch despite its benign appearance.
“Wifatch is a piece of code that infects a device without user consent and, in that regard, is the same as any other piece of malware,” said Mr.Ballano.
“It should also be pointed out that Wifatch contains some general-purpose back doors that can be used by the author to carry out potentially malicious actions,” he added.
