IT security concepts in smart homes

IT security is gaining importance in ever more areas of our lives. Examples of this are smart home devices such as lamps, washing machines, door locking systems and cameras that are networked and can often even be operated remotely via the internet. This adds a new degree of convenience, but also potentially gives hackers more backdoors into home networks. Devices must be afforded the highest degree of protection from the outset in order to reduce the risk of a successful hacker attack.

"Miele@home" technology enables numerous appliances to be networked and integrated into smart home applications. This makes it possible, for instance, to show the current operating status of a networked appliance, which comes in handy when you can see at a glance how long the washing machine in the basement still has to run. In addition, by means of an app, this also enables the user to check the status while on the go, such as whether they remembered to turn off the stove. To provide remote access, appliances connect to a dedicated Miele server over the internet. Access via the internet calls for special protection, e.g. to ward off hacker attacks.

For this reason, Miele decided to have the security concepts of "Miele@home" technology comprehensively tested by Fraunhofer IEM early on in the development process. This was to done to prevent highly sensitive and valuable data from getting into the wrong hands and guarantee the security of appliances.

In the first step, a workshop was held to consider the use cases of the appliances and define the protection goals. Based on the protection goals and possible threat scenarios posed by an attacker, Fraunhofer IEM analyzed the specification of the appliances and compared them with the state of the art. This ensured that the security concept for the "Miele@home" appliances was effective and that customer data was protected to the greatest extent possible.