Security Director Alert: 20,000 Printers Under the Siege

The notorious hacker and troll Andrew Auernheimer, also known as “Weev,” just proved that the Internet of Things can be abused to spread hateful propaganda.

On Thursday, Auernheimer used two lines of code to scan the entire internet for insecure printers and made them automatically spill out a racist and anti-semitic flyer. 

Hours later, several people started reporting the incident on social media, and eventually a few local news outlets picked up on the story when colleges and universities all over the United States found that their network printers were spilling out Auernheimer’s flyer.

Auernheimer detailed this “brief experiment,” as he called it, in a blog post on Friday. Later, in a chat, he said that he made over 20,000 printers put out the flyer, and defended his actions. more

Imagine the chaos if he sent a more realistic version of the coupon shown above, or false documents to internal company printers. Make sure all printers associated with your company operate in a secure manner – internal and home office units. Don't forget to check for insecure Wi-Fi settings as well. Need help? Call me.