The rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) has made life a lot easier for us indoors. Your lights go off automatically when you go to sleep, the temperature is monitored and continuously optimized and a smart speaker on your kitchen table answers all your questions and, with a bit of luck, ensures that you don’t have to get off the couch anymore. Sounds good right? And what if those devices may also perform actions without you being aware of it?
Bringing all that smart equipment into your home is accompanied by issues related to security and privacy and makes you think whether you don’t automatically bring in the manufacturer itself. There seems to be a trend of companies eager to get a place in your home.
An example of such a company is Amazon. They started a smart speaker trend with their Amazon Echo and still dominate the market in the United States with a market share of more than 70%. A group of researchers at the University of Washington found that Amazon extracts data from audio recordings to better target your ads. In addition, Amazon acquired video doorbell company Ring a few years ago, and it is known that the images can also be shared with third parties. And soon, in all likelihood, robot vacuum cleaner company iRobot will also be owned by Amazon, which will map out your entire home in order to function. Given the events with Echo and Ring, the question now arises, is Amazon going to use this data from your home to offer you even more personalized ads?
In addition to Amazon, companies such as Apple and Google are also busy equipping your home with all kinds of smart devices. Both claim, just like Amazon, to use the data only for the intended purposes, not to store the data unnecessarily and not to share it with other parties. Although after the aforementioned events with Amazon, you can wonder whether you can rely on those claims.
But can I no longer use these kinds of smart devices at all? In my opinion, that’s going a bit too far and I’m only too happy to believe that companies like Amazon, Google and Apple handle my data fairly. I do think it can’t hurt to be aware that the unjust use of your data from smart home devices is a possibility and it would be naive to assume that it won’t happen anyway. You probably never know for sure if and how they use your data, so I think the easiest thing to do is ask yourself if the risk of misusing your data is worth the convenience of the devices.
References:
ABC News, 2022, August 27. Amazon’s Roomba robot vacuum merger bid sparks privacy fears. [Online]
Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-28/amazon-rumba-bid-sparks-privacy-fears/101374130
[Accessed 9 September 2022].
Carbone, C., 2022, September 9. Is your Roomba spying on you? Privacy advocates slam Amazon’s $1.7B iRobot deal that fuels ‘pervasive surveillance’ because it can map out entire home layouts and connect to smart devices – as FTC now opens probe into buyout. [Online]
Available at: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-11197377/Advocates-blast-Amazon-1-7B-iRobot-deal-fuels-pervasive-surveillance-home.html
[Accessed 9 September 2022].
Touqeer, H. et al. , 2021. Smart home security: challenges, issues and solutions at diferent IoT layers. The journal of supercomputing, p. 37.
Williams, A., 2022, May 9. Smart home privacy: What Amazon, Google and Apple do with your data. [Online]
Available at: https://www.the-ambient.com/features/how-amazon-google-apple-use-smart-speaker-data-2765
[Accessed 9 September 2022].
Wilman, D., 2022, August 11. Amazon doet er alles aan om bij jou binnen te kijken. [Online]
Available at: https://www.businessinsider.nl/amazon-irobot-roomba-binnenshuis-kijken/
[Accessed 9 September 2022].
Nice post Tom! I agree with you that there is no way to know what those companies use our data for and even if they only use it for more personalized ads, just by collecting it and storing it already makes it vulnerable to a security breach. That being said, as with other data collection devices and applications such as Google and Facebook, it seems that the products are worth giving their data for and we don’t see a limit in the near future although I’m sure there is one. Personally, I think that when the incremental benefits are so low and not necessary such as ordering something by voice instead of doing it yourself, they can also become detrimental to people’s health and hence are not worth giving your data for. A line should be established about what data you give and how much of your life you want to automate, but that is up to each person to figure out for themselves.
Thanks for your insights Tom! I do agree that we have to be cautious with all the data these companies are gathering on us. Regarding IoT: what is your viewpoint on dependencies of these technologies? How dependent can we become? For example, what if there is a power outage or DDoS attack, we can’t use these systems anymore. Curious what you opinion is on these risks!