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Kashmir Hill and Surya Mattu, over at Gizmodo, write about wiring Kashmir's apartment with as many "smart" gadgets as possible and then observing the data flow. Some of the telemetry streams are not encrypted, some are. Both are observable by the companies they report to, but even those that are encrypted still tell the network in between a lot about the inhabitants of the house and their activities based on when they happen and their volume.
In December, I converted my one-bedroom apartment in San Francisco into a "smart home." I connected as many of my appliances and belongings as I could to the internet: an Amazon Echo, my lights, my coffee maker, my baby monitor, my kid's toys, my vacuum, my TV, my toothbrush, a photo frame, a sex toy, and even my bed.
[...] What our experiment told us is that all the connected devices constantly phone home to their manufacturers. You won't be aware these conversations are happening unless you're technically savvy and monitoring your router like we did. And even if you are, because the conversations are usually encrypted, you won't be able to see what your belongings are saying. When you buy a smart device, it doesn't just belong to you; you share custody with the company that made it.
That's not just a privacy concern. It also means that those companies can change the product you bought after you buy it. So your smart speaker can suddenly become the hub of a social network, and your fancy smart scale can have one of its key features taken away in a firmware update.
Usability was another aspect. She had no less than 14 different "apps" on her smartphone as well as several voice activated devices that still had comprehension difficulties.
(Score: 4, Funny) by realDonaldTrump on Sunday February 11 2018, @10:36AM (1 child)
The cell phone is very special. Like a crazy woman. You hold it wrong, it goes nuts. You touch it in the wrong place, it goes nuts. It does what it wants, not what you want. You need to be Steve Jobs to write a tweet.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Sunday February 11 2018, @11:09AM
That's okay, we know you're imperfect. That's why we voted you into office. But unlike George W. Bush, you had better expose the Jews for orchestrating 9/11.
Come on, Don. We're counting on you.