{"id":7512,"date":"2017-05-03T04:31:36","date_gmt":"2017-05-03T12:31:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2017\/05\/03\/news-1297\/"},"modified":"2017-05-03T04:31:36","modified_gmt":"2017-05-03T12:31:36","slug":"news-1297","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2017\/05\/03\/news-1297\/","title":{"rendered":"The Internet of messy things"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Credit to Author: Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols| Date: Wed, 03 May 2017 04:00:00 -0700<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the beginning, devices on the internet were fun. My favorite was the Carnegie-Mellon\u2019s Computer Science Department Coke Machine<\/a>. Starting in the 1970s, you could \u201cping\u201d it to see if it had sodas ready and if they were cold yet. It was good, silly fun. Now everything except the cat*<\/a> is hooked to the internet, and that\u2019s not so funny at all.<\/p>\n

Oh, sure, some internet of things (IoT) devices are enjoyable and useful. I have an Amazon Echo<\/a> in my bedroom and a Google Home<\/a> in my kitchen. I use them every day. But I\u2019m aware of their privacy problems. You should be too.<\/p>\n

For example, both devices are always listening to you. And when I say \u201calways,\u201d I mean every single second of every single day. In theory, they\u2019re both just waiting for their activation phrases, \u201cAlexa\u201d and \u201cOK Google,\u201d respectively. In practice, that means they\u2019re listening to you constantly.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not too worried about this. Unlike with Windows 10 Cortana, you can tell these devices to stop listening<\/a>. Of course, they\u2019ll be a lot less useful that way, but at least you have the option.<\/p>\n

No, what really concerns me about the IoT aren\u2019t the new devices that are explicitly connected to cloud services, it\u2019s the ordinary gadgets that are now listening in.<\/p>\n

Take, for example, my Vizio M50-C1 50-inch 4K ultra-HD smart LED TV<\/a>. It\u2019s a fine TV, but until recently it was tracking my viewing habits<\/a> and sharing this information with advertisers. Vizio wasn\u2019t the only TV company guilty of snooping. LG and Samsung have peeked into your viewing habits<\/a> too.<\/p>\n

Even devices such as \u201csmart\u201d toasters<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 yes there is such a thing \u2014 can tell their vendors what time you make toast in the morning. Or, more seriously, a hacker camping in your internet connection can track your toasting habits to figure out when you\u2019re not at home.<\/p>\n

You see, IoT devices tend not to have any security to speak of. Heck, even IoT security systems have been shown to be as secure as a lock made out of rubber bands<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Leaving aside how much damage home IoT devices can do for their owners, IoT gadgets are becoming the agents of choice for massive distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks<\/a>. Who knew your DVR could help wreck a business over the internet? Hackers knew, that\u2019s who!<\/p>\n

If that weren\u2019t bad enough, IoT firmware tends not to be updated at all. Once someone finds a security hole \u2014 and it can be as brainless as a single administrative password for all devices \u2014 it\u2019s open forever.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say your gadget can be updated. IoT devices tend to be patched automatically by the maker. Do you really want to try to get a drink of cold water from your refrigerator only to be greeted by a \u201cUpdate 32% complete\u201d message<\/a>? I don\u2019t think so!<\/p>\n

I love gadgets. I really do. But when it comes to the IoT, I prefer most of my devices to be dumb. They just work better that way.<\/p>\n

* There are actually a lot of IoT cat devices.<\/a> My calico, Mirabella Marvel, doesn\u2019t like any of them.\u21a9<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.computerworld.com\/category\/security\/index.rss<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Credit to Author: Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols| Date: Wed, 03 May 2017 04:00:00 -0700<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
\n

In the beginning, devices on the internet were fun. My favorite was the Carnegie-Mellon\u2019s Computer Science Department Coke Machine<\/a>. Starting in the 1970s, you could \u201cping\u201d it to see if it had sodas ready and if they were cold yet. It was good, silly fun. Now everything except the cat*<\/a> is hooked to the internet, and that\u2019s not so funny at all.<\/p>\n

Oh, sure, some internet of things (IoT) devices are enjoyable and useful. I have an Amazon Echo<\/a> in my bedroom and a Google Home<\/a> in my kitchen. I use them every day. But I\u2019m aware of their privacy problems. You should be too.<\/p>\n

To read this article in full or to leave a comment, please click here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[11062,10643],"tags":[6269,714],"class_list":["post-7512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computerworld","category-independent","tag-internet-of-things","tag-security"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7512"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7512\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}