KrØØk vulnerability could allow crooks to intercept WiFi data packets

ESET researchers revealed during a talk at RSA Conference 2020 a vulnerability found in more than one billion WiFi-enabled devices and access points that could allow an attacker to partially read encrypted data being transmitted.

Dubbed KrØØk, CVE-2019-15126 is a previously unknown vulnerability found in WiFi chips from Broadcom and Cypress. These are not only built into access points but a wide range of smartphones, tablets, laptops and IoT devices, from companies like Amazon, Apple, Samsung, Raspberry, Xiaomi, Asus and Huawei, reported ESET researchers Miloš Čermák, Robert Lipovský and Štefan Svorenčík.

The problem causes vulnerable devices to use an all-zero encryption key to encrypt part of the user’s communication. If successfully exploited an attacker could decrypt some wireless network packets transmitted by the device.

ESET disclosed the issue to Broadcom and Cypress and each issued a patch for their chips. However, any device that has not been updated is vulnerable.