This was brilliant and disturbing. The legal implications are crazy---even if the owner of the house has agreed to the EULAs of all the devices, their visitors have not. Is their a legal obligation to notify visitors that data about them is being generated, collected, snooped through, and potentially sold?<p>If people could be made more informed of what their devices are saying (and to whom) perhaps they'd be more reluctant to "smartify" their homes. Transparency would enable more informed decisions.
It's all extraordinarily creepy because you expect your home to be the safe haven of privacy, but considering how ubiquitous smartphones are and how much of our lives already happens digitally, you could somewhat cynically argue that the privacy loss is comparatively small (because you have very little to begin with nowadays).<p>But if smart utilities take off, maybe some privacy label for consumers would be nice. Maybe in the future it's a selling point if when device is dumb as opposed to smart and connected. I also somewhat dislike the conclusion of the article that smart homes for everybody are inevitable or necessary. The utility, at least right now, of smart devices seems to be limited, so you don't have even to be a crazy hermit to boycott a smart home.
Somewhat off topic, but anyone else think it's kinda weird that an article about data privacy has so many third party tracking scripts?<p>I know it's sitewide on every article from the mothership, Gizmodo, but still...
> Almost every TV on the market now is connected—because otherwise how do you Netflix and chill?<p>If you buy a "smart" TV, refuse to connect it to the internet and just get an Apple TV/Chromecast/whatever.
Once again, one of the biggest underlying problems is "why" - or more technically, what is the use case behind <technology>? This was always a problem back when it was merely "home automation" but as we started this "IoT" craze things only got worse.<p>I laugh at the ancedote in the article about voice control just behind frustrating and resorting to using the physical buttons.<p>No one has ever explained why I'd want to remotely control my lights. Or why I would remotely turn on my coffee maker, after I have to physically touch it to prepare it before-hand anyway.<p>Some amount of this tech is useful when it goes unnoticed and solves real problems. For example, my outside lights turn on dimly at sunset and turn off at midnight, unless there's motion or my garage door is open, then they go to 100%. If no inside lights are already on, the front hall and a couple other lights turn on as it gets dark. This means we never come home to a dark house, but also if we're already home, we aren't having lights automatically changing on us.<p>I can control many things from my phone, but it's pointless. There's a button in the entrance to the kitchen that turns on several lights (that otherwise require using switches in four separate locations), another that makes them all dim, and another for off. If we leave them on, they turn off automatically by 3am.<p>So much of these IoT products do not solve useful problems, do not blend seamlessly into your life, and do not even work well in the first place.
these smart homes bring up ethical dilemas. I worked for a company and someone got a home automation kit. It monitored comings and goings. They looked at the logs and realized the dog walker one day did a really short walk.
How do you broach this? Do you bother for an otherwise responsible walker.<p>I worked for a power monitoring company that put a box in your house, monitored power use for each circuit breaker. The CEO noticed that his house cleaners turned on lights in all the rooms and turned them off as they finished cleaning them.<p>You can learn a lot from watching a homes power, especialy if its split up circuit by circuit.
Where is the code/setup configuration for "iotea"?<p>Ever since "IoT" started gaining momentum as a marketing buzzword I have been thinking this type of router could be an interesting product for non-nerd users.<p>Idea: The one device that <i>only</i> the user controls. User veto over all traffic to and from "smart" devices. In theory.<p>I recall seeing a comment from a Googler on HN once that basically admitted the users only hope for privacy is to control a router.<p>Not a laptop, phone, browser, smart thermostat, smart speaker, etc.<p>A router.<p>Boring.<p>But not insignificant.<p>Something as inexpensive and accessible as an RPi was good enough for this user.
This simple horrifies me. Why would you do this to yourself and your family?<p>I don't see myself ever getting anything smart, and if I can't avoid it there is no way it touches my internet connection!
I'd rather live with the Amish or with John Plant than potentially be arrested by my own house or car. The house would merely lock me in but the car would no doubt drive me to the police station also.<p>I'd also rather get up to switch the lights on. Moving about periodically is healthy, right?
> Roomba requires your attention: Your Roomba is stuck.<p>Why?! When I bought a Roomba a decade ago, it was a decent vacuum that picked up dirt, could not connect to the internet, and never nagged me. Why would I want it to be worse?
As annoying as the "smart homes are annoying" posts are becoming, I really enjoyed the format and the depth of this article. And I didn't know one could buy internet-connected vibrators. That's... odd. I also don't know why these folks were surprised their devices were constantly communicating to their home servers.<p>My stance on the smart home and privacy phenomenon is optimistic. I think apple will eventually have a fully integrated smart home ecosystem similar to their standard ecosystem now, which will make the process easier in general. Perhaps we can one day have a single device to control every other device, or a few devices which perform multiple functions (such as a bundled music player, television, light controller, air monitor etc) and that such a device or devices will be bundled such that the meta data will contain only information that the device is being used but not which function is employed. Surveillance is unstoppable at this point, and this means that everyone has the ability to watch everyone else, and I think this is a good thing. We already have a good sense when those in our social group are lying, or hiding things, or even when they need help. If governments and citizens alike understand what each party is up to, we can have a fully accountable society, and of course eventually we must negotiate the relevant social rules that keeps this accountability relevant and practical. This is something I believe we have to work with. We have to take responsibility and understand what is going on, and to also take the power into our own hands and create balance. We can figure this out, and I don't believe that necessarily involves destroying the structure of how our governments and corporations do business. It's simply more efficient to restructure, not to totally resist but also not to be completely complacent. and that's all I have to say.