According to the company, the cybercriminals are hijacking home networks and everyday consumer connected devices to help carry out Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks on more profitable targets, usually large companies.
More than half of all IoT attacks originate from China and the US. High numbers of attacks are also emanating from Germany, the Netherlands, Russia, Ukraine and Vietnam.
As attackers are now highly aware of insufficient IoT security, many pre-programme their malware with commonly used and default passwords, allowing them to easily hijack IoT devices since they are designed to be plugged in and forgotten after basic set-up.
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