Comprehensive security How hackers attack your home and how you can best protect yourself
Whether it's a smart TV, robot vacuum cleaner or baby monitor - hackers are now using all kinds of gateways. Swisscom is putting an end to this.
No time? blue News summarizes for you
- Smart everyday devices usually have no protection of their own and are used by cyber criminals as a targeted gateway into the home network.
- Swisscom's new "My Security" blocks threats in real time at router level before they reach an individual device.
- This works automatically for all devices in the WLAN, even those without their own security software.
If you do the math at home, you'll soon be amazed. Smartphones, laptops and tablets are one thing. But then there are also smart TVs, games consoles, surveillance cameras, baby monitors, doorbells with Wi-Fi, robot vacuum cleaners and intelligent light bulbs. Everything online, everything connected, everything a potential gateway. And while laptops and smartphones might at least have an antivirus program, the smart lamp in the living room surfs the Internet completely unprotected. Criminals know this.
The Federal Office for Cybersecurity (BACS) analyzed over 2,347,000 reports of devices infected with malware in 2025 alone. This corresponds to an increase of 141 percent compared to the previous year. Anyone who thinks this only affects companies or particularly careless users is mistaken. Attacks have long since become part of everyday life. Via a phishing link in a text message, a fake parcel notification or a security vulnerability in a poorly secured IoT device that has never received an update since it was purchased.
The weakest link in the chain
The problem with networked everyday devices is structural. Manufacturers of smart lights or baby monitors earn their money with hardware, not software updates. Many devices hardly receive any security patches after purchase, some never receive them at all. Such devices are ideal for attackers. They are connected to the home network, run around the clock and are rarely monitored critically by their owners. After all, who has ever updated the firmware on their surveillance camera?
Until now, the traditional way to protect yourself was to install antivirus software on every device. This works reasonably well for laptops and smartphones, but there is simply no such app for robotic vacuum cleaners. And even where they do exist, who consistently installs and updates them on all devices in the household?
Protection at the source
In March 2026, Swisscom launched "My Security", an answer to precisely this problem. The idea is simple but convincing. Instead of protecting each endpoint individually, protection starts where all data passes through anyway - in the router. All connections that pass through the Swisscom Internet Box are checked for threats in real time. Malicious websites, phishing attempts and malware are blocked before they even reach a device in the household.
All devices are thus comprehensively protected without anyone even having to install an app. Swisscom's technology partner is Bitdefender, one of the most renowned providers in the security sector. The detection rate is said to be around 90%, which is significantly higher than the previous free "Internet Guard".
Unique in Switzerland for the time being
Swisscom is currently the only Swiss telecom provider to offer such router-based protection. Sunrise and Salt continue to rely on traditional antivirus apps that customers have to install themselves. However, this is unlikely to be a permanent solution. As soon as router-based security becomes the standard, other providers will follow suit.
Pure home network protection is available as "My Security XS" from CHF 6.90 per month. If you also want to be protected on the move, you need at least "My Security S" for CHF 9.90, which also includes a virus scanner, VPN and password manager for mobile devices. Important to know: Router protection does not apply outside your own WLAN, for example in a café or on the train.
