Mikko Hypponen, F-Secure’s Chief Research Officer, has a rule when it comes to electronic devices: “If it’s smart, it’s vulnerable.” Hypponen made this assertion over two years ago, and in that time it has become known as “Hypponen’s Law.” This law is becoming more applicable by the day, given the proliferation of smart technologies, which are increasingly present in both home and office environments, as well as in industrial settings. Even if the security of an individual device, such as a refrigerator, doesn’t seem to matter, Hypponen notes that attackers can leverage the access they gained to one vulnerable, unprotected machine to gain access to the network and pivot to something far more valuable. This is the essence of Hypponen’s Law: Anything that can be programmed can be hacked, and it may be hacked to get to something else that’s far more interesting than just the ventilation system. F-Secure.