Researchers at the Synopsys Cybersecurity Research Center (CyRC) have discovered an availability vulnerability in the IKEA TRÅDFRI smart lighting system.
An attacker sending a single malformed IEEE 802.15.4 (Zigbee) frame makes the TRÅDFRI bulb blink, and if they replay (i.e. resend) the same frame multiple times, the bulb performs a factory reset.
This causes the bulb to lose configuration information about the Zigbee network and current brightness level.
After this attack, all lights are on with full brightness, and a user cannot control the bulbs with either the IKEA Home Smart app or the TRÅDFRI remote control.
To illustrate how this would affect a user, Jonathan Knudsen, head of global research, Synopsys Cybersecurity Research Centre, shows a demo on how an attacker can exploit the vulnerability in smart lighting in this short one and half minute video (https://youtu.be/5BwiyaWg_8o).
It is also to highlight how it can be dangerous if an attacker disrupts or controls other smart IoT devices such as home security systems, smart door locks, thermostats, smoke detectors, kitchen appliances and more.
