On 5th July 2017, the ARD-Business programme 'plusminus' featured a report about interactive children’s toys in which Stefan Hessel, a student research assistant at Institute Director Prof. Dr. Christoph Sorge’s Chair, highlighted security loopholes.
At the beginning of this year, Stefen Hessel classified the children’s doll “My Friend Cayla” as an illegal transmitter in a legal opinion published by the legal journal JurPC. This led to the Federal Network Agency removing the doll from circulation. You can find the media reports here.
Stefan Hessel has now turned the attention of his research to other, similar, toys such as I-Que Robot and the teddy, "My Friend Teddy" and has come to similar conclusions: Third parties can access the toys from outside and capture data or manipulate children.