{"id":74053,"date":"2013-07-23T22:10:35","date_gmt":"2013-07-24T02:10:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/?p=74053"},"modified":"2016-12-08T17:04:38","modified_gmt":"2016-12-08T22:04:38","slug":"voip-hackers-shut-down-hospital-phone-lines","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/voip-hackers-shut-down-hospital-phone-lines\/","title":{"rendered":"VoIP Hackers Shut Down Hospital Phone Lines"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left\"><a class=\"post-thumbnail\" href=\"\/blog\/voip-insider\/files\/2011\/06\/Security.jpg\" onclick=\"ga('send', 'event', 'voip-insider-blog-post', 'click', 'image1');\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter  wp-image-34362\" alt=\"Security\" src=\"\/blog\/voip-insider\/files\/2011\/06\/Security.jpg\" width=\"360\" height=\"257\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/files\/2011\/06\/Security.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/files\/2011\/06\/Security-300x214.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 360px) 100vw, 360px\" \/><\/a><br \/>\nIs your <a title=\"VoIP phone system\" href=\"\/phone-systems\" onclick=\"ga('send', 'event', 'voip-insider-blog-post', 'click', 'VoIP phone system');\">VoIP phone system<\/a> secured against attacks?<\/p>\n<p>LA Times writer Paresh Dave <a title=\"VoIP phone hackers pose public safety threat\" href=\"http:\/\/articles.latimes.com\/2013\/jul\/18\/business\/la-fi-phone-hacking-20130719\" target=\"_blank\">reported <\/a>that a San Diego hospital was the victim of a distributed denial-of-service attack (<a title=\"DoS\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Denial-of-service_attack\" target=\"_blank\">DDoS<\/a>) when an &#8220;extortionist who, probably using not much more than a laptop and cheap software, had single-handedly generated enough calls to tie up the lines.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>For two days phone lines appeared busy to the outside world.<\/p>\n<h2>Who Is Affected?<\/h2>\n<p>David writes that according to vague mentions in law enforcement documents telecom industry insiders, there have been a range of VoIP victims including:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"line-height: 13px\">Hospitals, nursing homes, and medical centers<\/span><\/li>\n<li>A public safety agency and an emergency operations center<\/li>\n<li>A manufacturer<\/li>\n<li>Wall Street firms<\/li>\n<li>Schools<\/li>\n<li>Media<\/li>\n<li>Insurance companies<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>There are more but &#8220;Many of the victims want to remain anonymous out of fear of being attacked again or opening themselves up to lawsuits from customers.&#8221; And the FBI is reporting that victims have paid up to $5,000 just to get the attackers to stop.<\/p>\n<p>In the case of the San Diego hospital, the attack was stopped was using a &#8220;computer firewall filter.&#8221; There are devices available like <a title=\"Cisco security appliances\" href=\"\/manufacturer\/cisco\" onclick=\"ga('send', 'event', 'voip-insider-blog-post', 'click', 'Cisco security appliances');\">Cisco security appliances<\/a> that can\u00a0reducing exposure to threats and unauthorized access.<\/p>\n<h2>Ongoing Problem<\/h2>\n<p>Two years ago the <a title=\"ClueCon\" href=\"https:\/\/cluecon.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">ClueCon <\/a>VoIP conference featured a <a title=\"Why VoIP Security Matters To You\" href=\"\/blog\/voip-insider\/why-voip-security-matters-to-you\/\" onclick=\"ga('send', 'event', 'voip-insider-blog-post', 'click', 'VoIP security discussion');\">VoIP security discussion<\/a>\u00a0centered around the Lulz Security threats of the time, noting that,<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><em>Right or wrong, their hacking activities have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt two important points: Security is important, and good security is hard to find.<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><em>Couple that with the fact that there are hundreds of millions of VoIP endpoints installed around the world with more every day. IP PBX\u2019s and SIP trunks are ubiquitous.<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\"><em>Skype has well over half a billion users. VoIP security matters, whether you are a developer, a provider, or even simply the end user.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Now as VoIP adoption rises, so too does the threat. One Australian business <a href=\"\/blog\/voip-insider\/voip-security-simulated-hacker-attack\/\" onclick=\"ga('send', 'event', 'voip-insider-blog-post', 'click', 'lost $120,000 because of VoIP hackers');\">lost $120,000 because of VoIP hackers<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The FCC is working on a solution, reports David, but that may be a couple years away.<\/p>\n<p>Until then, you should do as much as you can to protect your networks and be aware of the threat because as Frank Artes of\u00a0<a title=\"NSS Labs\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nsslabs.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">NSS Labs<\/a>\u00a0was\u00a0quoted as saying, &#8220;For all the money spent on Internet security, companies often overlook protecting their telephones.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>via <a title=\"LA Times\" href=\"http:\/\/articles.latimes.com\/2013\/jul\/18\/business\/la-fi-phone-hacking-20130719\" target=\"_blank\">LA Times<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Is your VoIP phone system secured against attacks? LA Times writer Paresh Dave reported that a San Diego hospital was the victim of a distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS) when an &#8220;extortionist who, probably using not much more than a laptop and cheap software, had single-handedly generated enough calls to tie up the lines.&#8221; For two [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1220],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-voip"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74053"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74053\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":184603,"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74053\/revisions\/184603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.voipsupply.com\/blog\/voip-insider\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}