Agenda

We’ve unleashed our dark allies from the nightmare dimension on an unholy crusade to demonstrate cyberattacks for your enlightenment. If you love seeing devices compromised as much as we do, join us for a real hacking demonstration, detailed security research findings, and threat mitigation techniques that will disappoint bad actors. Share your new knowledge around the water cooler, apply these preventative security strategies within your own organization, and become the cool person at the office party everyone wants to hang out with regardless of that cat sweater you insist on wearing.

We’ll share stories from the trenches involving cybercriminals, nation-state actors, and defenders. Our presentation will detail findings from over six years of xIoT threat research spanning millions of production devices in enterprises and government agencies around the world. We’ll identify various steps organizations can take to mitigate risk while embracing a Things-connected world. We’ll also demonstrate a hack against an xIoT, or Extended Internet of Things, device. For those who would say, “But they’re just security cameras monitoring the parking garage, wireless access points in the cafeteria, or PLCs controlling robotic welding arms; what harm can they cause?” – this will illuminate that harm.

xIoT encompasses four disparate but interrelated device groups that operate with purpose-built hardware and firmware, are typically network-connected, and disallow the installation of traditional endpoint security controls. The first group contains enterprise IoT devices such as VoIP phones, security cameras, wireless access points, network attached storage, and printers. The second group includes OT devices such as PLCs, building automation systems, and industrial control systems. The third group consists of IoMT assets such as infusion pumps, patient monitors, and wireless vital monitors. The fourth group contains IIoT devices like robotics, smart factory systems, and temperature sensors.

There are over 50 billion xIoT devices in operation worldwide. Most of these devices run well-known operating systems like Linux, Android, BSD, and various real-time operating systems like VxWorks. Additionally, many xIoT devices have open ports, protocols, storage, memory, and processing capabilities similar to your laptop. But there is a major difference. Even though most enterprises and government agencies have tens to hundreds of thousands of these devices in production, they go largely unmanaged and unmonitored. These xIoT devices typically operate with weak credentials, old, vulnerable firmware, extraneous services, and problematic certificates. This massive, vulnerable xIoT attack surface is being successfully exploited by bad actors engaging in cyber espionage, data exfiltration, sabotage, and extortion, impacting xIoT, IT, and cloud assets.

Nation-states and cybercriminals have shifted their focus to xIoT attacks. Why? Because they work. Military-grade xIoT hacking tools are in use, cybercrime for hire that’s predicated on compromised xIoT devices has been monetized, and organizations worldwide are already “pwned” without even knowing it. Bad actors are counting on you being passive by not mitigating xIoT security risks. They want you to fail so they can continue to evade detection and maintain persistence on your xIoT devices. Disappoint them! Take your xIoT devices back by understanding how to hack them, recognizing where they’re most vulnerable, and employing strategies to successfully protect them at scale.

Security teams are struggling to manage high volume, high velocity data and threats are lost in an endless list of alerts. We’ll demonstrate how effective use of data pipelines reduces volume, amplifies signal to noise ratio, saves countless hours and dollars, and may even save the planet.

Key Takeaways:

• Most organizations ingest data inefficiently, resulting in duplicate, redundant, or useless information and false positives.
• The cost of inefficient data is far greater than monetary. it impacts security, engineering, and even the environment.
• Using data pipelines and effective data processing saves time, money, and frustration. Better data means stronger signal to noise and more effective threat detection.

A look at cybersecurity trends from 2022, how Expel caught these attacks in the wild, and how these trends can inform your security strategy in 2023.

We know that 2022 was fraught with security threats. But wrapping your head around what they were, what’s trending, and what to do about it is essential for your security strategy going into 2023.

Expel’s annual threat report, Great eXpeltations, compiles data, trends, and recommendations from the incidents our security operations center (SOC) saw in 2022, based on our full customer base: from small and midsize companies to enterprise orgs, at every phase of the security journey, across every industry Expel serves.

Join Chris Hencinski, Solutions Architect, Expel, for a deep dive into the numbers and their real-world incident counterparts, including examples of pre-ransomware, business application compromise, credential harvester phishing, SaaS compromise, and an attack against cloud infrastructure.