IPv4 Server Hacked in 12 Minutes While IPv6 Server Remained Untouched

A small experiment carried out by Sucuri's CTO, Daniel Cid, shows the security advantages IPv6 has over IPv4, but also the dangers of using factory default or common user-password combinations to secure online servers.

Cid carried out his experiment at the start of the month when he set up ten servers and left their SSH ports open to external connections. He ran five servers on IPv4-only addresses, while the other five ran only on IPv6 addresses.

Both servers had their root password set to "password," a big no-no on live production environments.

Party at IPv4's house, while crickets sing at IPv6

According to Cid, the first IPv4 server fell after only 12 minutes, with the other four servers getting hacked after a few more minutes. It took the hacker 20 seconds to brute-force the SSH root account.

On the other hand, Cid says that after a week, nobody even bothered to scan any of the IPv6 servers, at least once, let alone hack them.

"What we can d...