Kasa devices and Home Assistant - Integration now broken due to firmware update
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Hello everyone,
I created this post to raise awareness around TP-Link's recent changes affecting Home Assistant users:
https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/tplink/
Those who use Home Assistant consider it irreplaceable.
Arguably, Home Assistant offers the most complete feature and integration suite vs any competing power user home automation platform today.
It would be in the top right corner if there was a "Gartner Magic Quadrant for Home Automation Platforms".
Some of my personal use cases that were easily build-able because of Home Assistant:
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I use Home Assistant + my Kasa devices + my continuous blood glucose monitor to wake me up in the middle of the night when my blood sugar levels go low (e.g. turn on my bedroom lamps and lights when my blood sugar is below safe levels).
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I control all my house fans in the summer per-room with localized temperature sensors in each room of my house
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I turn my RGB lights red or blue if my insulin is approaching an unsafe temperature (freezing damages insulin).
The recent firmware changes completely break the sole reason I bought my TP-Link Kasa devices.
I fell in love with the Kasa product line's quality, price-point, electrical testing certifications and the open integration with Home Assistant.
Amazon reviews, YouTube videos, podcasts and community posts gave me comfort to invest heavily into the Kasa ecosystem.
With Kasa, I felt confident I would have a rock solid device from a big brand to use with Home Assistant.
I was an early adopter of WeMo and have since passed them on as gifts to others - I can't ask for them back now.
The few WeMos I still have work perfect with Home Assistant.
I've never felt worried about a firmware update breaking how my WeMos integrate with Home Assistant as Belkin understands Home Assistant use cases and the values users get from Home Assistant.
Belkin was victim to typical IoT security anti-patterns (e.g. unsigned firmware updates), but over the years has subsequently hardened their WeMo offering and still allow local control.
Users like myself have invested hundreds into TP-Link products (and my recommendations to friends have resulted in them spending hundreds).
We also (in good faith) allowed cloud connectivity (providing TP-Link with analytics data). I am now blocking all of that cloud connectivity.
Here are some community posts. It's only a matter of time before this gets picked up by HackerNews or another big tech site.
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https://community.home-assistant.io/t/tp-link-hs110-smart-plug-disappears-after-latest-firmware-update/244229
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https://twitter.com/TPLINKUK/status/1328687659133399043
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https://alerts.home-assistant.io/#tplink.markdown
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https://community.tp-link.com/en/home/forum/topic/236268
I strongly encourage TP-Link to work with the Home Assistant community in good faith to resolve this problem.
Other vendors like Phillips, Belkin WeMo, IKEA, etc. all understand the value of power users pushing the home IoT space forward and have not disrupted the local control capabilities of their products.
Some recommendations:
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Publish a secure local API for Kasa devices
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Allow for users at their discretion to opt-in / enable legacy versions of the port 9999 based API / old local control mechanism in the meantime
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Create a more secure implementation of the initial configuration mechanism (e.g. that does not use port 9999)
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Publish firmware release notes as per industry generally accepted practices
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Allow for opt-in beta testing of firmware
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Publish CVEs for vulnerabilities discovered as per industry generally accepted practices
I hope this post raises some more awareness for us Home Assistant users now left with 15+ "broken" devices!
Thanks for reading this!
I've lost sleep over my now broken smart home and am trying to constructively work on a solution!
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No kidding, what a horrible attitude.
So they discovered they screwed up on their cloud API: "planning to push more secure cloud API"? That's really, really scarey - a hacker is going to get in that way, they're not going to bother breaking one person's home wifi to gain control the devices locally. We are all at a terrible risk if they have failed to protect that API properly for so many years. Once into TP Link's cloud API a hacker will have a much easier time breaking back into many, many customer local lans, and it won't be to play with the lights. Not to mention TP Link has our email address, geographic location, wifi SSID, and wifi password already saved there in the cloud - if they can't protect their API, why should we believe they can protect our data?
And now, 'cause they screwed up there, they're going to close off the local API? Despite that we've been keeping ourselves completely safe from their blunder by blocking our devices from the internet and their cloud by using 3rd party apps?
If they were responsible and intelligent they would publish the local API, not block it.
The instant they push this new firmware is the instant I drop all support for TP Link. Don't bother "thanking me for my continued support".
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Is it safe to update US and Canadian models? Is there any plan to disable local control in these markets?
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the link (https://community.tp-link.com/en/smart-home/forum/topic/239408?page=1) implies the deadline for requesting a beta has passed. I've only just found out that I need to apply this to my two HS100 plugs.
Does anyone know whether I can still get this release or whther there is an alternative solution (short of replacing the plugs) for Home Assistant?
TIA
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Does anyone know if this policy is coming to US/North American devices? I'm looking to reccomend some more to family members in North America for use with Home Assistant and dont want to suggest Kasa smart plugs if they are just going to get the same eventual firmware update breaking local control.
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@WirelessForEver unless tp-link makes a very clear statement committing to allow "cloudless" local control of the Kasa devices by third-party apps -- i.e., they won't kill that functionality with future firmware updates as they have in the UK -- then I'd recommend going with a competitor's product. The Belkin Wemo stuff looks like a very good alternative. It's more expensive, but it works cloudless, and because it supports HomeKit it will likely always allow local control.
I hope tp-link is monitoring these forums. You folks are about to lose a ton of business from forcing people to use your cloud API.
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I really want to recommend TP-Link for a family member and a friend doing a new house builds (and do the majority of the switches / plugs TP-Link) but i'm really hesitant now without local control. They'd be using Home Assistant to control everything so local control is a must.
I agree with you that my original WeMo's have been solid and they kept their local control even when they had security issues.
I'd be really happy with some of the original solutions I posted.
Vizio recently added a simple paring code method to control their devices over local control (e.g. controlling my TV and sound bar from Home Assistant).
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Both my manually-configured HS210s quit working earlier this week. No amount of rebooting Home Assistant will fix it. I've verified their IP numbers haven't changed. They still work in the Kasa app. Is this related to a firmware update?
Logger: homeassistant.components.tplink.common Source: components/tplink/common.py:151 Integration: TP-Link Kasa Smart (documentation, issues) First occurred: 7:32:48 AM (506 occurrences) Last logged: 8:43:16 PM Unable to communicate with device 192.168.10.140: Communication error Unable to communicate with device 192.168.10.183: Communication error
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GnatGoSplat wrote
Both my manually-configured HS210s quit working earlier this week. No amount of rebooting Home Assistant will fix it. I've verified their IP numbers haven't changed. They still work in the Kasa app. Is this related to a firmware update?
Logger: homeassistant.components.tplink.common Source: components/tplink/common.py:151 Integration: TP-Link Kasa Smart (documentation, issues) First occurred: 7:32:48 AM (506 occurrences) Last logged: 8:43:16 PM Unable to communicate with device 192.168.10.140: Communication error Unable to communicate with device 192.168.10.183: Communication error
Are you in the US or UK?
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Still broken with HS110, hardware 4.1, firmware 1.1.0
TPlink refused to fix it, and there's no more firmware update.
They managed to remotely break my setup, quite incredible, and I got told that they don't wait to fix my device as we're past February 8th 2021, a sort of self-assigned "deadline".
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