Japan is preparing a national survey of some 200 million network-connected gadgets for cyber-security lapses because of the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.
From February the government-backed National Institute of Information and Communications Technology will start their survey to check potential vulnerabilities in the devices like routers, webcams, and IOT home appliances.
An institute spokesman persionTsutomu Yoshida said, for the study, researchers will take some common but unsafe IDs and passwords or uses that have the fear of malware like “abcd”, “1234” or “admin”. They will check the devices whether they are accessible by hackers.
Yoshida said, the researchers will survey the gadgets with the consent of internet service providers. They will mostly examine products that use physical cables to access the internet.
The institute will not conduct any expensive and complex operations that even not necessary too. They will not check each individual mobile gadgets like smartphones, but the survey may examine routers at cafes.
Yoshida informed that “Too often, we see webcams, for example, that are already being hacked because security settings are too simple and their images are being seen by outsiders. Sometimes they are put on public websites without the owners being aware”.
“We will see, of roughly 200 million products to be surveyed, how many are being exposed” to risks, Yoshida said.
He also added that “the survey will notify ISPs about vulnerable users without breaking into individual gadgets to view data stored inside.”
Last year, at the PyeongChang Winter Olympic Games, internal internet and wifi systems went down just as the opening ceremonies began. PyeongChang officials admit that they were a victim of a cyber attack, without elaborating further.
Major global sporting events like the Olympics and football World Cup and the face a growing threat from cyber attacks.
