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California passes law that bans default passwords in connected devices

Posted on October 6, 2018 by Dissent

I’m really going to miss California when it falls off into the Pacific some day.

Zack Whittaker reports:

Good news!

California has passed a law banning default passwords like “admin,” “123456” and the old classic “password” in all new consumer electronics starting in 2020.

Every new gadget built in the state from routers to smart home tech will have to come with “reasonable” security features out of the box. The law specifically calls for each device to come with a preprogrammed password “unique to each device.”

It also mandates that any new device “contains a security feature that requires a user to generate a new means of authentication before access is granted to the device for the first time,” forcing users to change the unique password to something new as soon as it’s switched on for the first time.

Read more on TechCrunch.


Related:

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  • HB1127 Explained: North Dakota’s New InfoSec Requirements for Financial Corporations
  • Industry Letter - June 23, 2025: Impact to Financial Sector of Ongoing Global Conflicts
  • Resource: State Data Breach Notification Laws - June 2025
  • Oklahoma Expands its Security Breach Notification Law
  • North Dakota Enacts Financial Data Security and Data Breach Notification Requirements
Category: State/Local

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