this post was submitted on 17 Feb 2024
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Why is the default setting to enable remote administration?
Because these routers went out to everybody. Tech heads and idiots alike. It is far easier for ISPs to simply remote in than rely on the consumer who may be an idiot.
This is why I run my own router. I'm sure my cable modem has a way in but then you'd have to get past my router.
Ditto. I went one step further and put OpenWRT on mine.
Messed up thing is, some ISPs make it an absolute bitch to make this work.
Yup. I used to think it was malicious by the ISPs but really it’s just all the end technology is kinda A mess for them to have control of the network for you. Which I’m gonna be honest 99.9% of customers NEED. lol
agreed my local area isp switched to calix for most of our customers and it's really nice just to have a management interface to all of our customers and be able to fix it without having to roll a truck
Yup. It’s never perfect but from a customer to tech support perspective it’s a lot easier for almost all end users. And anyone else can usually figure their own shit out anyways so that’s heavily offered also.
I can’t think of a single ISP that was using old Ubiquiti EdgeOS routers as consumer routers.
So if we're not talking about ISPs sending this out, then the reason that remote access gets turned on by default is incase the company sysadmin couldn't physically get to the device, and they assumed the company had a firewall.
Companies almost always prioritise OOTB setup and operationality over security when it comes to defaults.
They likely weren’t enabled by default at all. Because that’s generally not how company IT departments even remote manage these things. And the affected devices are the firewalls.
Remote administration was turned on manually, by the owners of these devices, because they didn’t know what they were doing.
20+ years ago I managed the installation of a high performance compute cluster purchased from IBM. Their techs did all the initial installation and setup, right down to using their well known default password of “PASSW0RD” (with a zero for the ‘o’) for all root/admin accounts…. It took less than 20 minutes for it to be compromised by an IP address in China.
At least other vendors like HP use random root/admin passwords printed on cards physically attached to new equipment…
When I used to rack and stack servers, many moons ago, we would always connect them to a switch with LAN only so we could use SSH/SCP to harden them before they got exposed. This was for .gov stuff that would get attacked instantly.
Because without it, the DOJ would have no control over you, duh
It wasn’t. Remote administration was enabled manually on these devices, and the admin passwords left default.
Because it was infected with malware from hostile countries.