Reportedly Hacked AI-Powered Robot Vacuums Allegedly Used for Surveillance and Harassment
May 24, 2024
Hackers reportedly exploited a vulnerability in Ecovacs’s Deebot X2 robot vacuums, gaining unauthorized access to camera and microphone controls. Users reported privacy invasions and offensive language broadcasted through the devices. Although Ecovacs claimed to have resolved the security flaw, researchers suggest vulnerabilities remain that could potentially leave users exposed to surveillance and harassment through their AI-enabled devices.
- Alleged deployer
- ecovacs-deebot-x2, ecovacs
- Alleged developer
- ecovacs
- Alleged harmed parties
- ecovacs-customers, ecovacs-deebot-x2-users, daniel-swenson
Source
Data from the AI Incident Database (AIID). Cite this incident: https://incidentdatabase.ai/cite/842
Data source
Incident data is from the AI Incident Database (AIID).
When citing the database as a whole, please use:
McGregor, S. (2021) Preventing Repeated Real World AI Failures by Cataloging Incidents: The AI Incident Database. In Proceedings of the Thirty-Third Annual Conference on Innovative Applications of Artificial Intelligence (IAAI-21). Virtual Conference.
Pre-print on arXiv · Database snapshots & citation guide
We use weekly snapshots of the AIID for stable reference. For the official suggested citation of a specific incident, use the “Cite this incident” link on each incident page.