How Can You Stay Secure at Your Smart Home?

According to Statista, there are approximately 26.66 billion connected devices today, and this number is growing every day. However, almost all smart home appliances, such as a smart TV, fridge, or thermostat, can become an easy target for cybercriminals. Internet Security Threat Report showed a 600% increase in the number of IoT (internet of things) attacks between 2016 and 2017.

“Smart devices are becoming more and more common in many homes. Technically, it can be any device that has a sensor and can transmit data through the internet,” explains Daniel Markuson, digital privacy expert at NordVPN. “Smart home devices include light bulbs, thermostats (like Nest), door locks, refrigerators, ovens, baby monitors, and other.”

However, according to NordVPN’s Daniel Markuson, IT professionals know very well that anything connected to the internet can be hacked. Sadly, the rush to get smart home appliances into the market makes security one of the weakest parts of this technology. There are a few examples already of internet-enabled TVs and even baby monitors being hacked.

“The good news is that you can use encryption to better protect all connected devices you have at home,” says Daniel Markuson, digital privacy expert at NordVPN. “Setting up a virtual private network on your router will secure all network traffic, including IoT devices.”

A VPN connection on your router means protection against man-in-the-middle attacks and hackers trying to compromise your Wi-Fi network. VPN can also prevent home devices from participating in botnet attacks.

The downside is that setting up a VPN service on a router manually may be complicated and confusing. However, you can get a special app for that, like FlashRouters Privacy App, which works with NordVPN – one of the most advanced VPN services in the world.

With the FlashRouters Privacy App, a user can easily manage the VPN connection on their router remotely from desktop or mobile phone. “That means you can forget manual switching and worries about security once and for all. The Kill Switch technology will disconnect all your devices in case the VPN connection drops. This way, you can be sure that your sensitive data will not be exposed, not even for a brief moment,” says NordVPN’s digital privacy expert. The application can be installed on any router running the latest DD-WRT firmware.