Work from Home (WFH) policies have been proliferating throughout organizations. Today. 70% of people, globally, work remotely at least once a week, and 53% work remotely for at least half of the week. However, with COVID-19 not ceasing, it is becoming more common for employees to work out of office; and this trend is likely here to stay. WFH brings about benefits to both the employee and employer in the form of greater flexibility, increased productivity and, as a result, higher profits.
However, with these benefits come perilous risks. The increased use by bad actors of Rogue Devices (manipulated hardware that acts with malicious intent) is being facilitated by these WFH policies since there are more entry points and fewer security measures in place (as, often, WFH is associated with BYOD).
Spoofed Peripherals and Network Implants have the ability to carry out various forms of attacks, including malware dissemination, data breaches, man-in-the-middle (MiTM) attacks, network sniffing, and more. The consequences of an attack can be substantial and are often made up of financial, reputational and legal costs, something that any organization wants to avoid.
Besides carrying out noxious attacks, Rogue Devices are almost impossible to detect, thus making them extremely threatening. Spoofed Peripherals are recognized as legitimate HIDs and Network Implants. They can go completely undetected as they operate on Layer 1 – the Physical Layer – which is not covered by existing security software solutions. As such, Rogue Devices do not raise any alarms.