Hub One Firmware Updates

[#1]

Hi,

I've had my Hub One since mid-January and not seen any updated firmware since the day it was turned on.  With my previous routers, (mainly Netgear), a check for updates was carried out every time I logged into the router home page and updates appeared from time to time.

I appreciate that four months isn't a particularly long time between updates, but I understood the router to be fairly new when I got it, so would have expected updates to be more frequent than with a mature device.  I think that the other thing that's worrying me is that there appears to be no mechanism in the admin pages to check for new updates either.

So is the Hub One maintained, or will it gradually become more and more vulnerable?

[#2]

The Plusnet Hub One is a re-branded BT HomeHub 5A, which is not a new device, and the Plusnet firmware will have been based on the fairly mature firmware for the BT HomeHub 5A.

[#3 · Accepted solution]

If the Hub One requires firmware updates, I'm sure we'll push them.

[#4]

Thanks for that.  So early bugs are likely to have been ironed out.  Nevertheless, bugs can remain dormant for years before they are identified, either by a security organisation, or by an exploit.

I hope exploits are patched as soon as they become public.

To answer my other question, will the patches be pushed, obviating the need for the user to fetch them?

[#5]

My response crossed over with Chris's ;-(

So we won't have to do anything.

[#6]

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav)
I have reset the fix to Chris as that is more appropriate.

[#7]

@TerryJC have a look in the Event log for CWMP entries. You should be finding some circa every 24hrs.

[#8]

Yes, I have those.

Presumably, if an update is needed Plusnet will push it using this mechanism.

Thanks for clarifying.

[#9]

Well I don't know about "push" in the traditional sense, as when it's been done with any previous modem/routers eg. the TG582n a few months ago, it was done by Plusnet to all relevant users and can also be done selectively to individual users.

I assume that with the Hub One (as with BTs HHs) any update is made available on that server and picked up by individual Hubs as and when.

Whether Plusnet can selectively push an update to a specific user (or group of users) for the Hub One, perhaps @Chris could find out for us?

[#10]

Yes.  When I talked about 'push' I wasn't expecting that Plusnet would update some users and not others.  A bug that affects me would also affect everyone else, presumably, so i would expect Plusnet to push the update to all Hub One routers that are connected to their network.

[#11]

To be clear, it's not specifically "bugs" I'm thinking about, it was more to do with the phraseology.

In the past there have been firmware upgrades for some of the different modem/routers. These have been available for users to download, should they want them. Most of them have been improvements and additional "features" whilst some have included minor bug fixes - most of which did not affect everyone.

Plusnet did not push these to all users with the particular modem/router .......until recently when they pushed an update to TG582n's which actually brought a long standing bug to the fore and have had to push a fix to that as well. But is is a specific action by Plusnet to do this.

Now with the Hub One if there are updates to the firmware they will presumably be made available via ACS in the same way that HHs have been for some time, which means users will automatically pick up an update as and when - experience shows not everyone seems to get them immediately for whatever reason.

My question to @Chris is very specific, as to whether Plusnet would be able to "push" an update to any individual (or group of) users as they have done previously or will it be the case that it can only be made available via the ACS.

[#12]

Thanks for clarifying.  I am not so concerned about additional features, (although every time I've bought a third-party router it was because the ISPs router was a bit short on functionality).  It would be nice to have some of the features that my Netgear ADSL router gave me, but they are not essential.

My main concern is security vulnerabilities, eg bugs.  I can live without features, but if I became the victim of an intrusion owing to an unpatched bug in the Hub one, I'd not be best pleased.

[#13]

Be afraid, be seriously afraid if you use the Hub.One as your only firewall.

I did a port scan and noticed that port 5060 was open to the planet despite not being in the firewall rules (and UPnP being off).  I saw 120 SIP registrations per second hitting my Asterisk server.  OK this is software firewalled but the traffic is still getting right through the firewall. 

I asked Plus.net about this and they said that because I'm using VoIP, UPnP (which is turned off) would have opened up the firewall, and as a result they would not need to do anything.

Personally if you are worried about security try doing a port scan on your IP from somewhere else in the internet.  In my case I didn't see any other unexpected ports open other than UDP 5060, but that's bad enough for me to consider buying another router (or putting OpenWRT on the hub one).

[#14]

a firmware update is needed.
I have bought 2 new chromcast audio wifi units for multi room audio. and this causes the hub one to reboot again and again. i am getting a new router sent to me by plusnet. but unless my present router is faulty this solution will not work. on the chromecast forum other plusnet and bt router users have the same issue.
please fix this 🙂

[#15]

try joining the preview programme and updating the firmware on the chromecast to 1.22.77272. seems to resolve the issue you are describing.