Farmers who employ Internet-connected and precision farming equipment should be very mindful of the way they configure their devices, the FBI warned in a public statement advisory at the end of March.

The Bureau, together with the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), issued the note on March 31, as an alert to the growing threat of IoT security.

The FBI is particularly warning against data breaches that may expose farming data saved with various companies or on cloud accounts.

“ While precision agriculture technology (a.k.a. smart farming) reduces farming costs and increases crop yields, farmers need to be aware of and understand the associated cyber risks to their data and ensure that companies entrusted to manage their data, including digital management tool and application developers and cloud service providers, develop adequate cybersecurity and breach response plans. ”

Hacktivism may also play a part

Additionally, the FBI is also sounding the alarm against hacktivists who might target farmers as a way of protesting against the US' agricultural policies.

An incident like this happened last fall, when Anonymous hacker leaked data of USDA employees to protest against Monsanto, a multinational corporation activating in the agricultural sector.

Because farmers have taken advantage of the recent technological breakthroughs and have populated their farms with so-called "smart" equipment, they have also exposed themselves as targets to hackers who may leverage the Internet connections that this machinery may now need.

An improperly configured smart tractor can leak data about the farm's production and activity, data that may end up in a competitor's hands.

FBI is trying to avoid the "healthcare disaster"

FBI and USDA officials claim they want to prevent a disastrous situation from repeating in the agricultural sector, similar to the one that occurred in the healthcare industry, which was caught unprepared for the arrival of the Internet of Things.

For this, the FBI has put forward a series of recommendations on which US farmers can build their cyber-security policies.

» Monitor employee logins that occur outside of normal business hours. » Use two-factor authentication for employee logins, especially remote logins. » Create a centralized Information Technology email account for employees to report suspicious emails. » Provide regular training to remind and inform employees about current social engineering threats. » Monitor unusual traffic, especially over non-standard ports. » Monitor outgoing data, and be willing to block unknown IP addresses. » Close unused ports. » Utilize a Virtual Private Network (VPN) for remote login capability.