The big lesson from the huge security flaw in Brother printers

Overlooking a step during setup can leave you vulnerable to hackers.

- BY ALAINA YEE

Last week, worrying news surfaced for millions of printer owners: Over 689 models of Brother printers are open to attack, along with 53 additional models made by Fujifilm, Konica, Minolta, Ricoh, and Toshiba (as if dealing with home printers wasn't already enough of a headache already). Worse, eight different flaws are exploitable, with one unpatchable.

The problem: The default administrator password on Brother printers (and those using Brother components) can be guessed (fave. co/40cNaU6), in part by exploiting other vulnerabilities in these devices. But a firmware update won't be able to address this issue, as what your printer ships with is already set.