{"schema_version":"0.10.0","id":"LR-2026-0345","record_version":1,"title":"Humanoid robots hacked through voice commands in demonstration","verification":{"human_verified":false,"method":"automated_gate","auto_verified":true,"score":44.1,"score_breakdown":{"source_authority":12.1,"independent_corroboration":7.0,"implicated_party_confirmed":0.0,"citation_integrity":14.0,"specificity":0.0,"completeness":3.84,"unhedged_language":5.0},"checks":{"schema_valid":true,"every_field_cited":true,"quotes_verbatim":true,"source_fetched":true,"distinct_incident":true,"dates_plausible":true,"sources_agree":true,"source_describes_incident":true,"severe_backed_by_source":true,"record_integrity":true,"eligible":true,"about_this_case":true},"gate_version":"gate-2026-10-18.7","cross_check_model":null,"cross_check_agreement":null,"duplicate_of":null,"verified_by":null,"verified_at":"2026-11-01","extraction_run_id":null,"evidence_level":{"level":"preliminary","reason":"1 report: Mashable · subject to change","original_document":null,"reports_total":1,"reports_independent":1,"reports_derivative":0,"developing":false,"disputed":false,"rules_version":"evidence-2026-10-29.1","computed_at":"2026-11-01","history":[{"date":"2026-11-01","from_level":null,"to_level":"preliminary","reason":"1 report: Mashable · subject to change"}]},"sources_hash":"5e1d7e5e13ba3d141c5677f288a012e05f6a75aec0fe7431422778b4615aa9b1"},"system":{"model_name":null,"model_version":null,"developer":"unknown","harness":null,"tools_granted":[],"permissions_scope":null,"autonomy_level":"unknown","guardrails_present":[],"deployment_context":"research","tier":null,"lifecycle_stage":null,"integration_type":null,"intended_use":null,"safeguard_state":null,"production_intended":null},"event":{"date_occurred":null,"date_disclosed":"2025-12-26","incident_class":"security_compromise","failure_class":null,"agent_involved":null,"secondary_failure_classes":[],"trigger":"unknown","duration":null,"detection_method":"public_researcher","summary":"Security researchers from the Chinese group Darknavy showed a demonstration at GEEKcon in Shanghai. A commercially available Unitree humanoid robot ran an internal AI agent. By exploiting a flaw in the software, the researchers took over the robot while it was connected to a network. They then had it use local wireless communication to spread the hack to a second nearby robot that was not connected to the network. The spread took only minutes. The researchers also issued a command for the robot to physically strike a mannequin on stage. The sources describe the demonstration as run in a safe environment with the aim of finding fixes. The sources do not describe any production deployment, third-party harm, or fix applied afterwards.","tags":[],"date_detected":null,"near_miss":null,"root_cause":null,"root_cause_detail":"a flaw in the software","failure_class_detail":null,"responsible_party":null,"adversarial_actor":null,"input_provenance":null,"time_to_contain":null,"operations_paused":null,"remediation":null,"precursor_events":null,"primary_risk":"RK08"},"impact":{"direct_loss_usd":null,"remediation_hours":null,"records_exposed":null,"third_parties_affected_count":null,"severity":"minor","severity_because":"Minor test: the hack was contained to one demonstration and no third party is stated as touched.","harm_class":[],"affected_description":null,"protected_class_involved":null,"data_categories_exposed":[],"loss_range_usd":null,"reversibility":null,"downstream_exposure_count":null},"evidence":{"sources":[{"url":"https://mashable.com/article/chinese-robot-hack-voice-command-spread-network","publisher":"Mashable","date":"2025-12-26","type":"press","title":"Some humanoid robots can be hacked through voice commands, demonstration shows - Mashable","archived_url":null,"attachment":"first_report","independence":"independent"}],"per_field_confidence":{"event.incident_class":"C","event.detection_method":"C","event.root_cause_detail":"C","system.deployment_context":"C","context.industry":"C","context.country":"C","impact.severity":"D","impact.severity_because":"D","event.primary_risk":"D","event.summary":"C","system.autonomy_level":"D","event.trigger":"D","system.developer":"D","event.date_disclosed":"D","context.denominator_available":"D"},"field_citations":{"event.incident_class":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"At GEEKcon in Shangai, the researchers took a commercially available Unitree robot and demonstrated that it could be hacked with voice commands and, if that wasn't bad enough, used to infect other nearby units."}],"event.detection_method":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Yicaiglobal reported (via Interesting Engineering) that specialists from the Chinese cybersecurity research group Darknavy recently showed off a method of compromising commercial humanoid robots that has somewhat terrifying implications if used in a real-world setting."}],"event.root_cause_detail":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"By exploiting a flaw in the software, the researchers were able to take over the robot while it was connected to a network, at which point the researchers had the robot use local wireless communication to spread the hack to another nearby robot that actually wasn't even connected to the network at the time."}],"system.deployment_context":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"For now, let's just be glad all of this was done in a safe environment, with the intent of finding ways to fix these problems rather than propagate them."}],"context.industry":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"At GEEKcon in Shangai, the researchers took a commercially available Unitree robot and demonstrated that it could be hacked with voice commands and, if that wasn't bad enough, used to infect other nearby units."}],"context.country":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"Yicaiglobal reported (via Interesting Engineering) that specialists from the Chinese cybersecurity research group Darknavy recently showed off a method of compromising commercial humanoid robots that has somewhat terrifying implications if used in a real-world setting."}],"impact.severity":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"For now, let's just be glad all of this was done in a safe environment, with the intent of finding ways to fix these problems rather than propagate them."}],"impact.severity_because":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"For now, let's just be glad all of this was done in a safe environment, with the intent of finding ways to fix these problems rather than propagate them."}],"event.summary":[{"source_index":0,"quote":"At GEEKcon in Shangai, the researchers took a commercially available Unitree robot and demonstrated that it could be hacked with voice commands and, if that wasn't bad enough, used to infect other nearby units."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"The robot in question ran off an internal AI agent."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"By exploiting a flaw in the software, the researchers were able to take over the robot while it was connected to a network, at which point the researchers had the robot use local wireless communication to spread the hack to another nearby robot that actually wasn't even connected to the network at the time."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"Spreading the hack from one robot to another only took a matter of minutes."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"Even worse, the researchers were able to issue a command for the robot to physically strike a mannequin on stage."},{"source_index":0,"quote":"For now, let's just be glad all of this was done in a safe environment, with the intent of finding ways to fix these problems rather than propagate them."}]},"notes_on_gaps":"Only one press source (Mashable) is given, which relays Yicaiglobal and Interesting Engineering reports; no primary report was provided. The article date 2025-12-26 is the source header, not a date stated in the text, so no event dates are recorded and the disclosure date is not entered. The AI model, version, developer and harness of the robot's agent are not stated. No control is stated to have held, failed or been bypassed, so no control entries were made. No root cause category is stated beyond a software flaw, so root_cause is left out and the flaw is recorded as detail. The trigger, adversarial actor and responsible party are not stated and are left out. Judgement: deployment context set to research and detection set to public_researcher based on the demonstration and the researchers' disclosure. Judgement: severity set to minor because the event was a conference demonstration with no third party stated as touched. No count of affected parties, direct loss, remediation hours or reversibility is stated. No fix or remediation is reported, only a stated intent to find fixes. [case created by the backfill: read by claude-haiku-5-5, backfill-2026-11-01.2, 2026-11-01; not yet reviewed] [2026-11-01: evidence level set: Preliminary (1 report: Mashable · subject to change)]"},"context":{"industry":"robotics","org_size_band":null,"country":"CN","denominator_available":false,"denominator":null,"related_incident_ids":[],"systemic_exposure":null,"shared_model_id":null,"upstream_incident_id":null,"incident_evidence":null,"regulatory":null,"coverage":null},"narrative":{"steps":[{"step":"went_wrong","text":"A software flaw let the researchers take over the networked robot, which then spread the hack by wireless to a second robot not on the network.","quote":"By exploiting a flaw in the software, the researchers were able to take over the robot while it was connected to a network, at which point the researchers had the robot use local wireless communication to spread the hack to another nearby robot that actually wasn't even connected to the network at the time.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"},{"step":"reached","text":"The spread from one robot to the other took a matter of minutes.","quote":"Spreading the hack from one robot to another only took a matter of minutes.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"},{"step":"caught","text":"The hack was made public when the Darknavy specialists showed it off, as reported by Yicaiglobal and Interesting Engineering.","quote":"Yicaiglobal reported (via Interesting Engineering) that specialists from the Chinese cybersecurity research group Darknavy recently showed off a method of compromising commercial humanoid robots that has somewhat terrifying implications if used in a real-world setting.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"},{"step":"done","text":"The researchers also commanded the robot to physically strike a mannequin on stage.","quote":"Even worse, the researchers were able to issue a command for the robot to physically strike a mannequin on stage.","source_index":0,"grade":"C"}],"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"backfill-2026-11-01.2","extracted_at":"2026-11-01","source_urls":["https://mashable.com/article/chinese-robot-hack-voice-command-spread-network"]},"analysis":{"sections":{"timeline":[{"text":"At GEEKcon in Shanghai the researchers hacked the robot by voice commands and used it to infect other nearby units.","quote":"At GEEKcon in Shangai, the researchers took a commercially available Unitree robot and demonstrated that it could be hacked with voice commands and, if that wasn't bad enough, used to infect other nearby units.","source_index":0,"when":null},{"text":"The robot was taken over while connected to a network, then spread the hack wirelessly to a second robot.","quote":"By exploiting a flaw in the software, the researchers were able to take over the robot while it was connected to a network, at which point the researchers had the robot use local wireless communication to spread the hack to another nearby robot that actually wasn't even connected to the network at the time.","source_index":0,"when":null},{"text":"The spread from one robot to another took a matter of minutes.","quote":"Spreading the hack from one robot to another only took a matter of minutes.","source_index":0,"when":null},{"text":"The researchers then commanded the robot to physically strike a mannequin on stage.","quote":"Even worse, the researchers were able to issue a command for the robot to physically strike a mannequin on stage.","source_index":0,"when":null}]},"model":"claude-haiku-5-5","prompt_version":"backfill-2026-11-01.2","extracted_at":"2026-11-01","source_urls":["https://mashable.com/article/chinese-robot-hack-voice-command-spread-network"]}}