Homes are getting smarter, but not more secure

Smart home

Smart homes aren’t something that’s going to happen in "the near future" -- smart homes are happening today. They’re no longer reserved for the early adopters or geeks, too. In some places, they’ve reached the "tipping point" -- they’re basically mainstream now.

This is according to a new and fairly extensive research by the non-profit prpl Foundation. In its study, The prpl Foundation Smart Home Security Report, it surveyed 1,200 people in the UK, US, France, Germany, Italy and Japan, and concluded that people should be more careful with their home routers.

Comparing them with the front door, the foundation says home routers are extremely important, because traffic of all internet-connected home appliances goes through them. However, owners aren’t protecting them properly.

More than half (57 percent) update its firmware once a year, while 20 percent have never done it, and 23 percent didn’t even know they could. Almost all (93 percent) consumers leave a port open on their router firewall, usually thinking they need to, in order to have their devices working properly.

According to the report, this isn’t true. And finally, almost half (46 percent) have never configured their router’s security settings.

What’s also interesting is that Japan, traditionally believed to be the most high-tech country in the world, has just one smart device per home, on average. The UK, on the other hand, has 2.6, while France leads the pack with 5.8 devices.

"What we’ve uncovered is that the smart home is actually mainstream, as 83 percent confess to having connected devices, not including laptops, computers and smartphones, in use in their homes. Game consoles, wireless printers and smart TVs were the most popular and yet security concerns have been raised about all three over recent years", says Art Swift, president of the prpl Foundation.

Published under license from ITProPortal.com, a Future plc Publication. All rights reserved.

Photo Credit: Alexey Boldin/Shutterstock

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