Your Washing Machine Might Be ‘Laundering’ Bucketloads Of Data Every Day
By Mikelle Leow, 16 Jan 2024
Image 16276070 © Diego Vito Cervo | Dreamstime.com
LG has been in the news lately thanks to all the innovations it unveiled at CES 2024, but its thunder is now awash with a new development it never intended to let out.
Johnie, also known as FinTech Geek, noticed something unusual with his LG washing machine recently. In a single day, the appliance reportedly downloaded 100MB and uploaded a whopping 3.57GB of data.
WTF! Why is my LG Washing Machine using 3.6GB of data/day? pic.twitter.com/xQqQicTqxI
— Johnie (@Johnie) January 9, 2024
To put this into perspective, that’s nearly 5% of his daily internet traffic, while typical data usage for such appliances hovers around 1MB per day.
The anomaly sparked a wave of theories and speculations, with some even humorously suggesting the washing machine might be engaged in cryptomining—perhaps spinning Bitcoin.
This isn’t the first time LG’s smart home technology has been under scrutiny. Back in 2017, a vulnerability dubbed ‘HomeHack’ was discovered in the company’s smart home infrastructure, potentially allowing attackers to remotely control connected devices.
LG’s SmartThinQ app, which allows users to manage and automate their household devices, including washing machines, could have been a factor. The app offers features like downloading additional wash programs, which might contribute to data usage, but certainly not to the extent reported.
However, the mystery was eventually unraveled. It turns out the issue stemmed from a bug in the Asus router tool used by the complainer, which led to inaccurate data usage reporting.
For those looking for an update, data usage has dropped since I posted this and blocked the device on my router.
— Johnie (@Johnie) January 9, 2024
Sorry if you were using my washing machine for bitcoin mining. But I'd gladly rent our the LPU (Laundry Processing Unit) by the hour. pic.twitter.com/uZzW3TcCt9
After he blocked the washing machine on his router, the consumption dropped significantly, pointing to a reporting error rather than the appliance itself being at fault. Not the soap drama ending you were expecting, we bet.
[via Techspot and Tom’s Hardware, images via various sources]