Heard a neighbor say their smart fridge got locked by a hacker asking for money

Honestly, I was at the hardware store yesterday and the guy in line behind me was telling his friend about it. He said they had to unplug the whole thing for a day to get it to reset. Tbh, it made me go home and check all my own smart home stuff for updates. I changed the default passwords on my thermostat and doorbell cam right away. Has anyone else had to deal with something like that with their smart gadgets?

3 comments

3 Comments

joseph_adams661mo ago

Changing default passwords is smart, but a separate network for your smart devices is even safer.

olivia_harris191mo ago

Totally true, but honestly, who has the time to set that up? I know I should, but my router's settings page looks like it's from 2005 and just figuring it out feels like a whole project. Feels like the kind of thing you only do after you read a scary news story about a hack.

lopez.karen1mo ago

Yeah, Olivia's right about that router setup feeling like a chore. I finally did it after my neighbor's baby monitor got weird. Took maybe 20 minutes to find the guest network option and give it a different name and password. Now all the smart plugs and that speaker are on their own thing, separate from our phones and laptops.