Elektor May 24, 2018
Belgian scientists have managed to hack a neurostimulator or ‘brain pacemaker’. They showed that it is possible to take control of the neurostimulator with inexpensive hardware. Using this approach, a person with malevolent intent could cause serious brain damage to patients, with fatal consequences. The scientists proposed new methods to improve the security of medical implants.
Neurostimulators are used to treat the symptoms of illnesses such as epilepsy and Parkinson’s disease. Using fine wires, they send controlled electrical pulses to specific parts of the brain. The neurostimulator is implanted in the patient’s body and is thus no longer physically accessible, so wireless communication is used to read out data and to adjust settings. A ‘clinician programmer’ is used for this purpose.
A fake doctor with low-cost hardware
A team of seven researchers at the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) were able to take control of a neurostimulator (to avoid copycat attacks, they did not mention the names of the device or the manufacturer).
More:
https://www.elektormagazine.com/news/scientists-hack-medical-brain-computer-interface
