With the robots intended for home
use — SoftBank's Pepper and NAO — IOActive found that
cyberattackers could
use them to record audio and video and secretly transmit this data to an external server.
Although they were successful in issuing commands such as switching the phone to airplane mode or manipulating the navigation system, the technique has significant limitations that will likely prevent
cyberattackers from
using it for evil (for instance, telling the device to visit a site where it would pick up a virus, or initiating outgoing calls to spy).