Millions of modems open to remote hacking

[_Ace]

More than 135 Million modems around the world are vulnerable to a flaw that can be exploited remotely to knock them offline by cutting off the Internet access.
The simple and easily exploitable vulnerability has been uncovered in one of the most popular and widely-used cable modem, the Arris SURFboard SB6141, used in Millions of US households.
Security researcher David Longenecker discovered a loophole that made these modems vulnerable to unauthenticated reboot attacks. He also released his "exploit" after Arris (formerly Motorola) stopped responding to him despite a responsible disclosure.
The Bug is quite silly: No Username and Password Protection.

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[itsfulloftuna]

I've never, EVER understood the reasoning behind these new cable modems not requiring a username and password. That's the simplest beginning level of security that one can impose on an appliance. I do remember some of the modems of yesteryear had this feature when the cable modem was owned by the ISP.