I thought my neighbor was just being paranoid about his router settings

He told me to change the default admin password on my home router, which I had left as 'admin' for over a year. Last month, I saw weird devices on my network and my smart lights kept turning off. I logged into the router and found the password was already changed by someone else. Had to factory reset it and set a strong password. Has anyone else had to deal with a router hack?

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lucas_jenkins5mo ago

Used to laugh at that stuff until my own webcam turned on by itself.

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wilson.claire4mo ago

Oh, come on now. @wright.michael I read that article too, and honestly I think it was blown way out of proportion. People getting spooked over a router in the basement? Sounds like a plot from a bad TV show to me. My webcam never did anything creepy - it just had a loose wire that made it flicker when my cat walked by and bumped the desk. I think the real problem is that folks are too quick to blame hackers for every little tech hiccup. Maybe check if your camera cord is plugged in all the way before you start worrying about phantom internet criminals. There's a reason why they call it "paranoia" and not "reasonable caution.

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wright.michael5mo ago

Read an article last week about a whole apartment building getting hit. Someone got into the main router in the basement and set up a separate guest network to mine crypto. Made everyone's internet super slow for months before they figured it out. Your story about the smart lights is creepy, makes me want to go check my own settings right now. How strong of a password did you end up making?

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