Ixia issues warning on Reaper IoT botnet

Ixia warned that new botnet known as “Reaper” is gaining traction and attacking IoT devices, especially routers, using publicly disclosed vulnerabilities which have not yet been patched on these devices. There is concern that a new wave of DDoS or other attacks could follow.

Ixia's Application Threat Intelligence (ATI) Research Center began tracking “Reaper” during the first week of October.

Last year, an IoT botnet known as “Mirai” created havoc for enterprise cyber business through DDoS attacks utilizing bots made up of IoT devices.

Ixia has applied the Reaper’s IoT router compromises to its ATI service for the company’s BreakingPoint and ThreatARMOR solutions.

“Ixia suggests that any IoT device with public Internet facing connectivity be patched with the latest updates and be closely monitored,” stated Steve McGregory, Senior Director of Application Threat Intelligence at Ixia. “Network visibility is the ability to know what is in your network and what it is doing, and it is a key tenet to being prepared to defend and proactively mitigate weaknesses in your network.”