Privacy Concerns about common IoT devices: first approach in Costa Rica

Abstract

The Internet of Things (IoT) devices have grown in popularity. The companies that built them have not included good security and privacy measures to protect the identification of the devices through an analysis of the metadata contained in the traffic packets. A case study was implemented with five IoT devices (Foscam camera, baby monitor, smart TV box, smart TV set, Hue Bridge light system) connected by an intranet. The traffic generated by those devices is analyzed in terms of packet size, external communications, DNS requests, traffic direction, and protocols used.The packet traffic lets us determine that during normal operation the IoT devices communicate with many sites around the world, sometimes in unexpected ways. We arrive at the conclusion that the IoT devices disclose private information about the life and costumes of the family members using them.