Sweyntooth Bluetooth Module Vulnerabilities

Sweyntooth is a collection of vulnerabilities that are known to affect several Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) modules from different manufacturers. A large number of Internet-of-Things (IoT) products are affected by the vulnerabilities to varying degrees, including some medical devices.

Threat ID:: CC-3376
Category:
Threat Severity:: Medium
Threat Vector:
Published:: 20 February 2020 12:00 AM

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Summary

Affected platforms

The following platforms are known to be affected:

Various IoT products, including the following medical devices (an exhaustive list is not available at the time of publication):

Medtronic pacemakers and Implantable Pulse Generators - Azure, Cobalt, Crome, Percepta, Serena and Solera series
Syqe inhalers
Vivachek blood glucose and multi-function meters

Threat details

The vulnerabilities are reported to arise from non-conformance to the BLE specification. The most severe vulnerability was found to affect one BLE module and allows an attacker to access an affected device without completing the usual pairing process. The other vulnerabilities can be exploited to cause a denial-of-service (DoS) on a device.

The vulnerabilities can be exploited from within BLE radio range. The product impacts vary depending on how BLE communication is handled and how much operation depends on the affected BLE modules.

For further information:

Remediation steps

Type	Step
	An exhaustive list of affected products is not available at the time of publication. Administrators should seek advice from product vendors about whether their devices are affected and can be updated, particularly for any medical devices where Bluetooth is regularly active.