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posted by janrinok on Thursday March 08 2018, @03:21AM   Printer-friendly
from the internet-or-security dept.

Ross Anderson in the Security Group at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory asks some questions about whether durable goods such as cars can be Internet-connected and yet provide sufficient privacy and safety. It's not a deep discussion but it does raise a few other pertainent questions.

Perhaps the biggest challenge will be durability. At present we have a hard time patching a phone that's three years old. Yet the average age of a UK car at scrappage is about 14 years, and rising all the time; cars used to last 100,000 miles in the 1980s but now keep going for nearer 200,000. As the embedded carbon cost of a car is about equal to that of the fuel it will burn over its lifetime, we just can't afford to scrap cars after five years, as do we laptops.

Meters and medical devices are two more examples of hardware that can cause great harm when control of the integrated software is taken over by malfeasants.

Source : Making security sustainable.
and Making Security Sustainable: Can there be an Internet of durable goods? (warning for PDF)


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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by anubi on Friday March 09 2018, @09:59AM (9 children)

    by anubi (2828) on Friday March 09 2018, @09:59AM (#649896) Journal

    Yup, I sure got a nice warm feeling over rescuing something, and being able to fix it back up to what I really wanted in the first place.

    I feel I actually own this thing.. not just renting the right to drive it.

    After my bouts of nausea in the showrooms, I knew really well that what I really wanted was to go back in time and buy the van I bought when it was brand new. So I had to settle for the next best thing... get what I could, knowing full good and well that even if it took the price of a brand new modern van to fix the old one up to "like new", I would still much rather have the "old school" technology than the "new school" technology, even if I was to pay the same price for either.

    For the same reasons I would rather have my old mechanical bimetallic mercury thermostat than a NEST. That old bimetallic thermostat with that little ball of mercury sealed in a glass tube has been working for 40 years. Absolutely elegant design. And I did not have to agree to anyone's customer lock-in contract in order to use it.

    --
    "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
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  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Friday March 09 2018, @08:40PM (8 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Friday March 09 2018, @08:40PM (#650216)

    So, we don't have a Nest, but we do have an Ecobee, because that cute little bimetallic strip was located in a non-representative temperature location in the house - with the Ecobee we have 4 thermosensors distributed around the house and can make some data-based decisions about air-flow balance, etc. Now, why in hell I have to go through a remote website to access the thermostat on the wall of my home from my phone that's on the same local network? That should be illegal.

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]
    • (Score: 1) by anubi on Saturday March 10 2018, @04:48AM (7 children)

      by anubi (2828) on Saturday March 10 2018, @04:48AM (#650390) Journal

      Absolutely.

      Should I have the same need, I would use my Arduinos.

      Mostly because I know the Arduinos so well I can use the same building block to build nearly anything I need.

      --
      "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
      • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday March 10 2018, @05:30AM (6 children)

        by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday March 10 2018, @05:30AM (#650406)

        Ecobee thermosensors are also PIR motion sensors and battery powered - lasting over a year on a 2032 coin cell, impressive.

        --
        🌻🌻 [google.com]
        • (Score: 1) by anubi on Saturday March 10 2018, @06:46AM (5 children)

          by anubi (2828) on Saturday March 10 2018, @06:46AM (#650431) Journal

          Thanks.. I will have to look into those. The CR2032 is one of the very few cells in my stock, as even the local dollar store carries packs of 'em for a buck.

          Right now, I have the old existing thermostat wire... which has 24 volt control power. Something like I had to connect one wire or the other to ground to call for heat or cold.

          I looked into it a long time ago when someone gave me an old thermostat. That was during the last energy crisis I believe in the 70's. I ended up giving that old thermostat away to a restaurant where a lady friend of mine was working as a waitress.

          She told me her customers were complaining that it was too hot or cold in the restaurant. Her boss, though, told her to leave the thermostat be. So I asked her to introduce me to her boss, and I mounted the old thermostat to the wall behind the counter, in full view of the customers, so that when one complained, she could go "adjust" it. It wasn't connected to anything. Just screwed to the wall. But it kept the customers happy. And netted her some tips.

          It was one of those type that had the contacts though, not the mercury one. The contacts were pitted, and would not work reliably. It was a fitting end for the thing.

          --
          "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
          • (Score: 1) by anubi on Saturday March 10 2018, @06:52AM (4 children)

            by anubi (2828) on Saturday March 10 2018, @06:52AM (#650433) Journal

            Forgot to mention... that's why I love forums like these... someone would now really have a helluva time trying to sell me a NEST after I read your post.

            --
            "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
            • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday March 10 2018, @11:54PM (1 child)

              by JoeMerchant (3937) on Saturday March 10 2018, @11:54PM (#650686)

              Well, YMMV - We bought a handful of LaCrosse BIG LCD digital clocks back in the '90s, they still run nearly 5 years on a pair of AAs - recently we bought a couple more, and neither of them will run even 3 months on a pair of fresh from the package Duracell AAs. I suspect PCB cleaning issues, but mostly I'm just disgusted with the experience: new clock, looks awesome - 3 months later, oh man maybe the batteries were stale, 3 more months later: nope, this thing is a POS. Rinse, lather, and repeat with the next one.

              --
              🌻🌻 [google.com]
              • (Score: 1) by anubi on Sunday March 11 2018, @08:54AM

                by anubi (2828) on Sunday March 11 2018, @08:54AM (#650852) Journal

                There seems a lot of "cost cutting" going on with companies these days, as they perceive a few cents cheaper to produce means more profit. They are quite willing to trade off a reputation for quality for a better quarterly return. Then they take the money run to the next company who will hire them at top dollar to do the same for them.

                I watched this type destroy a company I worked at. They come in, quickly cash out the company's reputation, a few people get very good bonuses, the rest of us get pink slips, and the real estate is sold.

                Have you taken the covers off the clocks to verify its the same circuit board? Some of those earlier clocks ran on 4000 series CMOS logic, and easily went years on a cell, however the newer ones are likely a microcontroller clocking along at 4MHz, and drawing uA instead of pA.

                I just had to send back one of the TECSUN 18650 radios I just bought off of Amazon for similar issues... battery life, with the radio supposedly OFF, was four days. It was a quality control issue... the other three work as expected. I'll probably write an Amazon review over it, so I can bring up what to look for so in case anyone else gets one with that issue, they know they got a dud too, send it back, and get one that works.

                --
                "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
            • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 11 2018, @03:07AM (1 child)

              by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday March 11 2018, @03:07AM (#650747)

              Also, what, you don't trust the hundreds of (shill) "Man this product is just perfect, exactly what I was looking for..." reviews on Amazon?

              --
              🌻🌻 [google.com]
              • (Score: 1) by anubi on Sunday March 11 2018, @08:31AM

                by anubi (2828) on Sunday March 11 2018, @08:31AM (#650842) Journal

                Also, what, you don't trust the hundreds of (shill) "Man this product is just perfect, exactly what I was looking for..." reviews on Amazon?

                Think I haven't seen those ads promising me $20 for me to write a five-star review of some product on Amazon? Some products I read, the whole review section looks like one big ad. Just like Southerners have a distinct dialog, so do ad-people. Buy now! Limited supply! Only ($price)! See that and run. That's the standard bait line.

                I always read the reviews from the worst up.

                The moaning of a pissed off customer means orders of magnitude more to me than the glorious rapports of those paid to post.

                But even then, some of those are posted by competitors.... so I have to look for specifics. I want to know WHY the one-star rating. If its the truth, bringing the matter into a courtroom with defamation of character charges will only result in a courtroom of snickering jurors.

                Once above 3-star, reading the review is near useless. If I see even one 5-star review that smacks of paid-review, I have to assume the high order reviews are salted and damn near useless.

                --
                "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]