By Allan Lengel
ticklethewire.com
The FBI is recommending owners of small office and home office routers reboot the devices to temporarily disrupt the malware and aid the potential identification of infected devices linked to Russia that has infected hundreds of thousands of internet routers.
The culprits are using VPNFilter malware that is able to perform multiple functions, including possible information collection, device exploitation, and blocking network traffic, the FBI said in a press releases.
The malware targets routers produced by several manufacturers and network-attached storage devices by at least one manufacturer, the FBI said. The initial infection vector for this malware is currently unknown.
VPNFilter is able to render small office and home office routers inoperable. The malware can potentially also collect information passing through the router. Detection and analysis of the malware’s network activity is complicated by its use of encryption and misattributable networks, the release said.
