'ZDNet is reporting on a security breach leaking "a massive list of Telnet credentials for more than 515,000 servers, home routers, and IoT (Internet of Things) 'smart' devices."

The list, which was published on a popular hacking forum, includes each device's IP address, along with a username and password for the Telnet service, a remote access protocol that can be used to control devices over the internet... Some devices were located on the networks of known internet service providers (indicating they were either home router or IoT devices), but other devices were located on the networks of major cloud service providers...

According to experts to who ZDNet spoke this week, and a statement from the leaker himself, the list was compiled by scanning the entire internet for devices that were exposing their Telnet port. The hacker then tried using (1) factory-set default usernames and passwords, or (2) custom, but easy-to-guess password combinations.... To our knowledge, this marks the biggest leak of Telnet passwords known to date.

As ZDNet understands, the list was published online by the maintainer of a DDoS-for-hire (DDoS booter) service... When asked why he published such a massive list of "bots," the leaker said he upgraded his DDoS service from working on top of IoT botnets to a new model that relies on renting high-output servers from cloud service providers.'

-- source: https://it.slashdot.org/story/20/01/19/1649234

Cheers, Peter