Insulin pump maker ignores hacker’s warnings

Remember the diabetic hacker, Jay Radcliffe, who exposed the security vulnerabilities of the insulin pump at the recent Black Hat computer security conference earlier this month? Well, Radcliffe thought he’d do the public a favor by informing the manufacturers of the insulin pump about the issue, but it looks like his advice wasn’t taken very seriously, if taken at all.

According to the hacker who recently updated the Associated Press about the situation, Medtronic (the company that created the pump) simply ignored him when he tried to inform them about the situation. Radcliffe previously declined to name the model or manufacturer so that he could contact them in private, but since they chose to ignore him, he has revealed the company behind the device.

Medtronic had previously responded to Radcliffe by issuing a statement that said users could protect themselves by turning off the wireless function of the pump – which is kind of silly, since most users probably bought the pump because of its wireless feature in the first place. The company also said “To our knowledge, there has never been a single reported incident outside of controlled laboratory experiments in more than 30 years of device telemetry use, which includes millions of devices worldwide.” – which basically dismisses Radcliffe’s findings as an unnecessary call for action.

Since Medtronic refused to do anything about it, Radcliffe has since then switched to another manufacturer for his insulin pump. However now that the story is out in the open, and more people are aware of the pump’s vulnerabilities, don’t you think Medtronic should do something about it? After all, it’s better to be safe than sorry.

George Wong
Categories: Medical
Tags: diabetes, Hacking, Security