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Google Tackles Chromecast Wi-Fi Blasting Bug

posted by martyb on Monday January 22 2018, @01:44AM   Printer-friendly
from the awake-from-sleep-and...-KA-BOOM! dept.

Fnord666 writes:

Google is rolling out a patch today which will fix a bug that slows down Wi-Fi networks connected to both Android and Chromecast built-in devices. According to a blog post, Google said a bug in its Cast software on Android phones may incorrectly send a large amount of network traffic, which can slow down or temporarily impact Wi-Fi networks.

[...] Google says it has identified the issue, and the fix will be issued via a Google Play service update. The company says users experiencing the problem should reboot their phones and check that their Wi-Fi router has been updated with the latest firmware.

Source: TheVerge

Also at: BBC and The Register.

Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by frojack on Monday January 22 2018, @02:08AM (3 children)

    by frojack (1554) Subscriber Badge on Monday January 22 2018, @02:08AM (#625916) Journal

    The problem was never in the phone. The problem was in the chromecast devices and it has been there since they were first introduced.

    From the get go, the advice on Google forums was to de-power your chromecast device if your wifi was becoming wonky, or nobody could connect.
    And this always worked, since the very first day of availability. This problem has been in the field for years. Google claimed they had it fixed with the new version of the hardware. But the problem persisted, because it was the software all along.

    The router manufacturers finally tracked this down. Google was too lazy to bother as long as a 1 minute shutdown fixed the problem.

    The Register's writeup of a few days ago was more accurate and informative than Google's own statement. Apparently Google is taking a page from Apple's play books here by suggesting the problem still lies in the router.

    Per El Reg:

    The bug is not in the routers, but in Google's "Cast" feature, used in Chromecast, Google Home, and other devices. Cast sends multicast DNS (MDNS) packets as a keep-alive for connections to products like Google Home, and it seems someone forgot to configure the feature to go quiet when Chromecast devices are sleeping. ... It should be noted that the router vendors' fixes are mitigations while the world waits for Google to patch Cast.

    --
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @08:10AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @08:10AM (#625989)

    I found it strange that many people point their finger to Google, and not the router manufacturers.
    Sure, selling a device that could DOS your network is bad, but a router should not crash when it sees too many packets in the first place. Now it is the chromecast that does this, next time it will be some hacked IOT device.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @09:45AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 22 2018, @09:45AM (#626014)

    The bug is not in the routers, but in Google's "Cast" feature

    Wait, so the Chromecast is sending fully documented crash packets to the router? And these packets are authenticated?

    If not, it bloody well IS a bug in the routers.

  • (Score: 2) by ledow on Monday January 22 2018, @01:28PM

    by ledow (5567) on Monday January 22 2018, @01:28PM (#626054) Homepage

    The devices shouldn't send those packets.

    But a router is your first defence against rogue / unknown / unwanted packets but can't handle a small burst of 10,000 or so packets on modern kit, without failling into a state that affects all users detrimentally?

    Both are at fault. But one is severely failing in its core purpose while the other just has a slight miscode as a local network device.

    P.S. I have a Chromecast. I've never seen this problem. Because I VLAN, QoS and rate-limit access, not to mention enable "wifi fair sharing" so things can't hog the wireless, to the Chromecast so it doesn't just run off and swamp my wifi, kill my Internet, slow down my games. That's what routers DO. That's their job. And because my router was working properly the Chromecast bug was probably unnoticeable (it probably showed up on the internal "DoS" list if it hit a packet limit, but that's about it).

    The point of a router is to route. If you send 10,000 packets to it, it acts upon them blindly, and in doing so gets itself into a tizzy including stopping other devices communicating, you really, urgently need a new router. Because it's only a matter of time before someone does that to you remotely and just knocks you off the net entirely.

    But if a Chromecast is just rude and sends out 10,000 announcement packets? Meh. Update the firmware when convenient or filter them out.