Maple Grove Report

Maple Grove Report

Subscribe to Our Newsletter

Get our latest articles delivered straight to your inbox. No spam, we promise.


Home Assistant works with a huge number of smart home devices, but it doesn’t work with everything. If you have smart home tech that you’ve not been able to connect to Home Assistant in the past, it’s worth checking again.

Home Assistant Green on an entertainment stand.


Home Assistant Is the Answer to Your Smart Home’s Biggest Issues

Command a vast range of devices, with or without an internet connection.

Home Assistant adds integrations at a crazy pace

Every release adds more options

Home Assistant release notes. Credit: Tim Brookes / How-To Geek

Home Assistant releases updates on a monthly cycle, with smaller patch releases during the month. Each monthly update adds new features to Home Assistant, and these always include new integrations that have been officially added to Home Assistant.

There are usually a significant number of integrations added each month. For example, the 2026.4 release included 14 new integrations, including Infrared, UniFi Access, WiiM, and Autoskope. Over the past 12 months, there have been no fewer than four new integrations in any release, with some months adding as many as 17.

This doesn’t include custom components that you can install via HACS that are not officially supported integrations. Many of these custom components allow you to connect smart home devices that aren’t supported by Home Assistant integrations, and some custom components go on to become official integrations.

Home Assistant Green

Dimensions (exterior)

4.41″L x 4.41″W x 1.26″H

Weight

12 Ounces

Home Assistant Green is a pre-built hub directly from the Home Assistant team. It’s a plug-and-play solution that comes with everything you need to set up Home Assistant in your home without needing to install the software yourself. 


Infrared support opens up a huge number of old devices

If it has an IR remote, there’s a good chance you can control it

Infrared light on a remote for a 15-year-old television. Credit: Nathaniel Pangaro / How-To Geek

Some new Home Assistant integrations only allow you to connect a limited number of smart devices from a specific brand. There are some, however, that open up access to a whole swathe of smart home devices. One such example is the Infrared integration, which was added in Home Assistant 2026.4.

The Infrared integration adds native support for controlling IR devices such as TVs or AC units using Home Assistant. In the past, to do so, you needed to use manual workarounds or custom integrations, but Home Assistant now has a dedicated native platform for infrared control.

It means that you can turn cheap ESP32 devices into infrared proxies that can send and receive IR signals and control them directly from Home Assistant. For example, you can send commands to your TV as if you were pressing the buttons on your remote, and use them to turn on the TV, change the channels, turn up the volume, and more.

Currently, there’s only an LG Infrared integration that will let you control an LG straight out of the box, but for other IR devices, you can use the remote.learn_command action to learn the commands that your remote sends out, and the remote.send_command action to send these commands from your IR proxy. It means that in theory, you can add almost any IR device that uses a remote to Home Assistant.

Bluetooth and Matter support continues to develop

Support for all the major protocols

An ESP32 microcontroller on a desk. Credit: Adam Davidson/How-To Geek

Infrared devices aren’t the only devices that you can add to Home Assistant. There’s support for all the major protocols, including those that you might not expect.

For example, if you have Bluetooth smart devices around your home, you may assume that you can’t hook these up to Home Assistant due to the limited range of Bluetooth. However, you can also use ESP32 devices as Bluetooth proxies and place them near your Bluetooth devices. These proxies can receive commands over Wi-Fi from Home Assistant and send out the relevant Bluetooth signals to your Bluetooth devices, controlling them as if they were already within Bluetooth range of your Home Assistant server.

Home Assistant also has mature support for Matter, and continues to add new Matter features. Home Assistant 2026.4 included an update that allows you to manage users and PIN codes for Matter-compatible smart locks directly from within Home Assistant. If you have Matter devices, Home Assistant is a great way to connect and control them.

How to check if your existing devices are supported

Auto-discovery does a lot of the work for you

If you want to see if a smart home device you own will work with Home Assistant, there are a few things you can do. The first is to see if the device is automatically discovered. Power the device on and ensure it’s connected, and you may find that it appears in Home Assistant’s list of discovered devices.

If it isn’t, the next step is to search for an official integration. On the Integrations page, click the Add Integration button and type the brand of your device to see if any results appear. If they do, install the integration and follow the setup instructions to connect your device.

If there’s no official integration, you can try HACS. This is a store of community-created custom components, many of which allow you to connect specific brands of smart home devices. If you can’t find a custom component in the HACS store, try searching online, as some require manual installation.

If nothing works, you can try the Home Assistant community forums. You may find that someone is working on a solution.


Check your devices before you replace them

Home Assistant supports a huge range of smart home devices, and the list continues to grow. Before replacing old gear or assuming a device won’t work, it’s worth checking Home Assistant again. Support may have arrived since the last time you checked.



Source link


Hasbro hit by cyberattack, investigates possible data breach

Pierluigi Paganini
April 02, 2026

Hasbro suffers a cyberattack, disrupting some operations; the company is probing the scope and potential data compromise.

Toy giant Hasbro reported a cyberattack on Wednesday that disrupted certain company operations. The firm is investigating the full extent of the incident, including whether any files or sensitive data were compromised, as it works to restore normal business processes.

Hasbro is a major American toy and board game company known worldwide for creating and selling popular products like Transformers, My Little Pony, Monopoly, Nerf, and Play-Doh. Founded in 1923, it has grown into a global entertainment brand, also producing movies, TV shows, and digital games based on its toy franchises. The company has a strong global presence, selling in over 100 countries and constantly expanding through acquisitions.

On March 28, 2026, the company detected unauthorized access to its network. It quickly launched its security response, took some systems offline, and began an investigation with the help of external cybersecurity experts.

“On March 28, 2026, Hasbro, Inc. (the “Company”) identified unauthorized access to the Company’s network. Upon discovery, the Company promptly activated its security incident response protocols, implemented containment measures, including proactively taking certain systems offline, and launched an investigation with the assistance of third-party cybersecurity professionals.” reads a FORM 8-K filed with SEC. “The Company’s investigation is ongoing, and it is working diligently to resolve the matter and determine the full scope of impact.”

Business continuity plans are in place to keep orders, shipments, and key operations running, though some delays may occur. Hasbro is reviewing potentially affected files and will take further actions, including notifications if needed, while strengthening its security measures.

“The Company is also working to identify and review the files potentially impacted and will take additional actions as appropriate based on its review and findings, including providing any notifications deemed necessary under applicable law.” concludes the FORM 8-K. “The Company will continue to implement measures to secure its business operations and take additional steps as appropriate.”

Based on the details disclosed by Hasbro regarding the effects of the attack and its response, the company may have been targeted by a ransomware group. At this time, no extortion group has claimed responsibility.

Follow me on Twitter: @securityaffairs and Facebook and Mastodon

Pierluigi Paganini

(SecurityAffairs – hacking, cyberattack)







Source link

Recent Reviews