The German government has revealed plans to issue guidelines and rules for securing Small Office and Home Office (SOHO) routers. Published by the German Federal Office for Information Security (BSI), the rules have been put together with input from router vendors, German telecoms, and the German hardware community. Once approved, router manufacturers don’t have to abide by these requirements, but if they do, they can use a special sticker on their products showing their compliance. While Germany isn’t passing official laws, it will become the first country that tries to pass any kind of router-specific guidelines.
Lamar Bailey, Director of Security Research and Development at Tripwire:
“I like the idea of showing a device has been certified to meet minimum security standards but I think the focus is wrong. The focus should be on consumer products because they are more of a risk and the end users are generally less informed than small business owners.
A sticker showing a device has met a standard (like we do with RoHS) could be a market differentiator for vendors and give end users more piece of mind.”
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