Actually, as consumers, they (mostly) do have options - lots of them.
In my case, I avoid the whole IoT thing like it were some virulent form of radioactive space herpes. It's not out of paranoia, but because my rural Satellite ISP has a bandwidth cap during most of any given 24-hour cycle. This means not bothering with the cute little automated/networked thermometers, televisions, refrigerators, etc...
To be honest, I don't see much value in them anyway - at least not at this time; I'm perfectly capable of setting a thermostat (or throwing another log into the wood stove), and keeping a mental inventory of what's in my refrigerator. There are promising technologies/devices out (e.g. the Amazon Echo thingy), but in all honesty, they're nice-to-have things, not need-to-have (and unless you're severely disabled, nearly all of them are not much more than glorified monetization opportunities for whoever sells the thing to you - again, see also the Amazon Echo thingy).
Anyrate, yes the consumer (that is, you and I) have the ultimate power over how much these things influence and potentially control our lives and out stuff.
Now there may be exceptions (say you bought some swanky condo or rented an apartment that has all this stuff in it), but they can be disabled to an extent (or even hijacked by you if you know how and see a use for doing so.) It ultimately depends on you.
Eventually, I can see where you'd have no choice but to buy such things because alternatives would cease to exist... but even there, you can simply, say, assign them to an SSID that you've throttled down to 14.4k or some obscenely low rate, then take the extra step of firewalling the shit out of that network to allow only established/related ports. Or, just hack the thing to taste (after all, phones can be jailbroken fairly quickly, so...)
I'm in the same boat. Due to numerous other Wi-Fi links around where I live, at best, I get reliable signal in one room, but that pretty much it. Because there are just so many devices yakking on Wi-Fi, even the 5Ghz band, where devices are supposedly to find the channel that is used the least, are saturated.
As for IoT devices, I do watch occasionally the Fiver channel on YT, which always has some new IoT item. Some are cool, others... why bother? If I were to spend the price premium for a "smart" fridg
I've never understood why IoT devices don't move to a hub/spoke model. A hardened, central hub that does the Internet communicating, and the devices use Bluetooth and are paired with the hub (or hubs).
Many do: Philips Hue, SmartThings, Iris (Lowes), VeraLite, and others do, except it's Z-Wave and/or ZigBee rather than Bluetooth that does the communicating. (Low-energy Bluetooth wasn't around when these standards were created, and Z-Wave and ZigBee also have the ability to form a mesh network rather than each needing to connect to the central bridge/hub.) WeMo is a notable one that doesn't work like this, as are Nest and several AppleHome Kit-capable products that connect directly to WiFi. I don't like th
In my case, I avoid the whole IoT thing like it were some virulent form of radioactive space herpes. It's not out of paranoia, but because my rural Satellite ISP has a bandwidth cap during most of any given 24-hour cycle.
For me, it is because IoT is another way of saying "recurring monthly bill" or "forced obsolescence"
Oh, look, I have a nice alarm clock that is connected to the internet, has an app store, collects data about me and will stop functioning when the manufacturer doesn't feel like supporting it any more.... what a deal!
Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
The convenience is worth the risk. The dumb-ass majority has spoken.
Re: (Score:5, Insightful)
Fair point. But did they have any other options?
Are there secure IoTs?
Maybe, just maybe, the developers/manufacturers are at some fault.
Re:Too late (Score:5, Insightful)
Fair point. But did they have any other options?
Actually, as consumers, they (mostly) do have options - lots of them.
In my case, I avoid the whole IoT thing like it were some virulent form of radioactive space herpes. It's not out of paranoia, but because my rural Satellite ISP has a bandwidth cap during most of any given 24-hour cycle. This means not bothering with the cute little automated/networked thermometers, televisions, refrigerators, etc...
To be honest, I don't see much value in them anyway - at least not at this time; I'm perfectly capable of setting a thermostat (or throwing another log into the wood stove), and keeping a mental inventory of what's in my refrigerator. There are promising technologies/devices out (e.g. the Amazon Echo thingy), but in all honesty, they're nice-to-have things, not need-to-have (and unless you're severely disabled, nearly all of them are not much more than glorified monetization opportunities for whoever sells the thing to you - again, see also the Amazon Echo thingy).
Anyrate, yes the consumer (that is, you and I) have the ultimate power over how much these things influence and potentially control our lives and out stuff.
Now there may be exceptions (say you bought some swanky condo or rented an apartment that has all this stuff in it), but they can be disabled to an extent (or even hijacked by you if you know how and see a use for doing so.) It ultimately depends on you.
Eventually, I can see where you'd have no choice but to buy such things because alternatives would cease to exist... but even there, you can simply, say, assign them to an SSID that you've throttled down to 14.4k or some obscenely low rate, then take the extra step of firewalling the shit out of that network to allow only established/related ports. Or, just hack the thing to taste (after all, phones can be jailbroken fairly quickly, so...)
Re: (Score:2)
I'm in the same boat. Due to numerous other Wi-Fi links around where I live, at best, I get reliable signal in one room, but that pretty much it. Because there are just so many devices yakking on Wi-Fi, even the 5Ghz band, where devices are supposedly to find the channel that is used the least, are saturated.
As for IoT devices, I do watch occasionally the Fiver channel on YT, which always has some new IoT item. Some are cool, others... why bother? If I were to spend the price premium for a "smart" fridg
Re: (Score:2)
The same reason security is an afterthought :(
Re: (Score:2)
I've never understood why IoT devices don't move to a hub/spoke model. A hardened, central hub that does the Internet communicating, and the devices use Bluetooth and are paired with the hub (or hubs).
Many do: Philips Hue, SmartThings, Iris (Lowes), VeraLite, and others do, except it's Z-Wave and/or ZigBee rather than Bluetooth that does the communicating. (Low-energy Bluetooth wasn't around when these standards were created, and Z-Wave and ZigBee also have the ability to form a mesh network rather than each needing to connect to the central bridge/hub.) WeMo is a notable one that doesn't work like this, as are Nest and several AppleHome Kit-capable products that connect directly to WiFi. I don't like th
Re: (Score:2)
In my case, I avoid the whole IoT thing like it were some virulent form of radioactive space herpes. It's not out of paranoia, but because my rural Satellite ISP has a bandwidth cap during most of any given 24-hour cycle.
For me, it is because IoT is another way of saying "recurring monthly bill" or "forced obsolescence"
Oh, look, I have a nice alarm clock that is connected to the internet, has an app store, collects data about me and will stop functioning when the manufacturer doesn't feel like supporting it any more.... what a deal!