$25,000 prize for fighting zombie botnets

FTC offers reward to protect consumer Internet of Things

If you can come up with a tool that keeps zombie botnets from taking over your connected hairbrush, refrigerator or nanny cam, the Federal Trade Commission wants to give you $25,000.

The agency has announced a prize for whoever creates the best tool to protect consumers from security vulnerabilities in the software of connected home devices, often called The Internet of Things. There’s also up to $3,000 available for three honorablemention winners.

The announcement coincides with this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, where connected devices are front and center.

“Every day American consumers are offered innovative new products and services to make their homes smarter,” said Jessica Rich, director of the agency’s Bureau of Consumer Protection.

“Consumers want these devices to be secure, so we’re asking for creativity from the public — the tinkerers, thinkers and entrepreneurs — to help them keep device software up to date,” she said.

The FTC is calling it the IoT Home Inspector Challenge.

Contestants are required to de- velop a tool that deals with the problem of out-of-date security software in connected home devices.

Computer security requires ongoing updates in the ever-escalating fight against attackers. While computers and smart phones generally update themselves automatically when new software is available, that’s often not the case when it comes to the plethora of connected devices such as webcams, connected door locks and other items that are flooding into homes.

Poorly-secured webcams hijacked by hackers were used to power the Mirai botnet, a cyber weapon that knocked Internet traffic company Dyn offline for much of a day in October, taking with it dozens of popular websites.

Several companies have announced plans to produce routers and other devices that will secure connected devices, including Norton’s Core, coming this spring. The FTC wants to encourage efforts to create tools to help consumers with that.

Submissions will be accepted starting in March, and the final deadline is May 22. Winners will be announced in July 2017. Complete rules have been published in the Federal Register.

“Consumers want these devices to be secure, so we’re asking for creativity from the public.” Jessica Rich, Bureau of Consumer Protection.