Pupils, students and scientists love the ‘pib’. The robot is easy to make and easy to program. And thanks to our hardening script, the 3D-printed humanoid robot is now better armed against cyber attacks.
pib – the affordable do-it-yourself robot
Many science fiction films feature robots, androids and other artificial life forms that assist humans in everyday tasks or in spaceships. This scenario is now more ‘science’ than ‘fiction’!
On the one hand, tens of thousands of robots are already working in industry, automating production, and on the other, robots are conquering universities and homes. One of the latter is the ‘printable intelligent bot’, or ‘pib’ for short.
The pib is an open source project from isento, a German IT service provider based in Nuremberg. The human-like robot can be built by anyone with a few tools, materials and a 3D printer.
Find out more about the concept in this video:
The mission: to protect pib against cyber attacks
The pib is currently used in education (schools, training centres, universities) and science. It is also very popular in the private sector.
This is understandable because, in line with the open source philosophy, everything worth knowing about the “printable intelligent bot” is freely available on the Internet. Free software such as Linux and ROS2 (Robot Operating System) is also used. This means that schoolchildren, students or hobbyists can build their own PIB and customise it to their own liking.
But as Stan Lee wrote in 1962: ‘With great power comes great responsibility’. These words ring true now more than ever! Robots simplify and automate many tasks – that’s very convenient. But what happens if hackers take control of a robot? The consequences could be serious…
To significantly reduce the risk of such a horror scenario, FB Pro is working with isento. Our System Hardening experts have developed a free script to ‘harden’ the pib system. You can download it from GitHub.
🔽 pib Hardening Script: Download
What are the benefits of the pib System Hardening?
Every pib robot runs on Ubuntu Linux, ROS2 and Rosbridge Server as standard. This open architecture offers a great deal of flexibility, but also harbours potential security risks.
Therefore, a Secure Configuration, a System Hardening, is of crucial importance. It significantly reduces the attack surface and makes it much more difficult for attackers to compromise the robot system or even take over all important functions.
In other words, hardening ensures that the ‘windows’ and ‘doors’ of the systems are closed, figuratively speaking.
How pib hardening works
We used the CIS Ubuntu Linux 22.04 LTS Benchmark v2.0.0 as the basis for our hardening script. This is because the recommendations of the Center for Internet Security (CIS) are very suitable for professional Linux System Hardening.
For use on the pib robots, we have largely adopted the CIS-L1 standard and, where necessary, adapted it according to our expertise. After installing the pib hardening script (the instructions are also available on GitHub), the robots continue to function smoothly, so there are no restrictions. However, they are now ‘hardened’ and significantly more resilient to cyber attacks!
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‘Ensuring the security of pib is a very high priority for us, especially in an increasingly networked world. With the new System Hardening, we are not only protecting sensitive data, but also the integrity of the entire robot infrastructure. This step is crucial to ensure long-term trust in humanoid robots in general and to enable the use of pib in safety-critical areas in the future.’
Jürgen Baier
Managing Director of isento GmbH & co-founder of pib.rocks
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Do you have any questions?
Would you like to find out more about pib technology? You can find all the relevant information in the Knowledge Base and on Discord.
Do you use pib or other robots in your company or organisation, perhaps in critical areas? Do you need support to ‘harden’ these systems or large IT infrastructures? We are happy to support you with our solutions! Simply get in touch with us.
Images: isento / Adobe Firefly