Isis hacked my fridge!

As the Jetson connected-home dream becomes a reality, security specialist Lancope’s tech chief warns of a ransomware revolution

Insight by Lancope’s TK Keanini

“Honey, nothing in the house seems to be working and I have this email here that says something about sending Bitcoin to turn everything back on…”

Today, ransomware is becoming big business for cybercriminals. They target computers, smartphones and even online retailers with attacks that crash your machine or specific apps, preventing access to data or media with the threat of permanent disabling or deletion. To free your machine of choice, you need to pay up, usually via an untraceable virtual currency such as Bitcoin.

This is possible, of course, because the web connects computers around the globe. Yet this growing network now includes gadgets in your home and on your body. With Samsung buying SmartThings and Apple’s HomeKit on the way to kickstart the “internet of things” again, it could soon be connecting just about everything to everything else.

As a result I have bad news, and then really bad news. The bad news is that we live in a world with a growing number of hackers who want to target you. From criminal gangs to freelance black hats and even terror groups such as the notably web-savvy jihadist group ISIS, they want your data and your money.