Comment by frik | Hacker News Reader

Comment by frik | Hacker News Reader

TL;DR: It's about the "Internet of Things"

It's a buzzword with an vision that can have a positive but also a negative outcome for our society.

For example: The nest thermostat learns your behavior and selects your favorite temperature depending the day of time, the ambient light, ... it learns with you - and actually helps to save you energy. The opposite is a "smart meter" forced on you by new regulations that isn't smart at all and doesn't help you to save energy but sends your power usage data (your private life data) in regular intervals over the net to the usual data collectors.

Another example: All Ford automobiles that come with the Sync board computer (2008-2015, Windows CE based) can be optionally set to do the following in the event of a crash (at the time when the airbags go off): use your phone connected via Bluetooth, set a call to the international emergency hotline, speak via the Nuance Text-To-Speech software an emergency text including your current position (car have an inbuilt GPS antenna) and open the microphone so that you can talk with the emergency hotline or at least they can hear the audio if you are unable to speak. On the otherside, some lobbies try to propose in the US/EU a new law where every car has to share its location and some other "metadata" in a short interval (as soon as you turn on your motor) to a central data collector - so that in the event of an accident they know where you are, as they say.

Decide yourself which version of the "Internet of Things" vision you want to have in your everyday life.

> TL;DR: It's about the "Internet of Things"

^ this is too ambiguous to be meaningful for anyone who isn't familiar with the cyber grand challenge (CGC).

the CGC, as i understand it, is about developing systems which can autonomously detect and patch vulnerabilities[0].

i believe this is interesting for a couple of reasons:

1. a self-repairing system could prevent data breaches (or mitigate damage).

2. this type of system could use its knowledge to attack other systems.

on a somewhat related note, i'm reminded of elon musk's reaction [1] to prof. nick bostrom's book [2], "superintelligence":

"We need to be super careful with AI. Potentially more dangerous than nukes."

though i don't claim to know the motivation/context behind musk's remark, it's easy to envision the dangers associated with a couple of AI's "duking it out" on the interwebs. (CBS's "person of interest" is a fun, fictional series that covers this scenario [3].)

[0] here are a couple of participating teams:

* http://forallsecure.com/ * https://www.trailofbits.com/

[1] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/495759307346952192

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superintelligence:_Paths,_Dange...

[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Person_of_Interest_%28TV_series...

The nest thermostat is a completely different device from an utility smart meter.

For example, I can see smart meters helping provide real time data to the utility about power usage. Utilities are engaged in an enormous task of forescating power demand, which is probably much harder than weather forecasting even (as that is a subtask of demand forecasting!) -- and can net huge savings for the companies; or allowing more fair pricing schemes that discourage usage in times of high demand; etc. That's a real benefit for society.

I don't think there's a need to put a tin foil hat and demand that all personally identifiable information collection be ceased. We instead just have to make sure this info is getting used properly (within the designated scope) with according security for each problem. In other words: scrutiny, not celibacy.

> completely different device

You can twist it how you like but it doesn't make a difference - it's a device that the PR suggests that it helps you save energy and costs. One device (Nest) lives up the dream and is great, the other (smart meters) is the opposite - but it could be a great device too if it would live up the original PR vision.

> enormous task of forescating power demand

Not really, the electrical power transformer stations that are physically located near your home already communicate about the power demand habits to the central power grid network. There is no technical reason to track every single house hold every 15min or every hour.

> provide real time data to the utility

Do you believe it's great that a washing machine is running during the night to save costs for the power company (and maybe you) but keeps you and your neighbors awake and you have to deal with wrinkled laundry in the morning?

One can save energy at home, but the biggest power consumers at home are devices that are used at specific times - and that time cannot be deferred to the night - except one wants to be the slave of his own devices. On the other side a lot of energy could be saved in industrial production by optimizing processes.

Next time one buys a device check the energy rating - but be smart and cautious as some very energy efficient rated devices like new electric kettles and vacuum cleaners consume less power by using less Watt which means physically it takes longer to boil the water or the vacuum cleaner is less efficient as the engine is less powerful and it takes longer to clean your home.

Far better for the environment is to install photovoltaic panels near your home yourself. Especially then an electric car makes a lot of sense.

> it's a device that the PR suggests that it helps you save energy and costs.

I think being able to see your usage broken down to more than one reading per quarter can definitely help. You can then change your behaviour and see the improvements very quickly. One product many of the companies hand out with smart meters is something that sits there and tells you how much you're using right now. I can easily see that making people realise just how much they're using while not realising it, and turning some things off.

> but be smart and cautious as some very energy efficient rated devices like new electric kettles and vacuum cleaners consume less power by using less Watt which means physically it takes longer to boil the water or the vacuum cleaner is less efficient as the engine is less powerful and it takes longer to clean your home.

While you do need to check, you can definitely get lower powered kettles and vacuums (particularly the latter) that are as good or better. The EU has come around to regulating vacuums because many were just putting uselessly big motors in that did nothing really helpful for actually cleaning, but used loads of energy since people see a higher power and think it's automatically a better vacuum.

>I don't think there's a need to put a tin foil hat and demand that all personally identifiable information collection be ceased. We instead just have to make sure this info is getting used properly (within the designated scope) with according security for each problem

Smart meters are a great example of what can go wrong. Before pot growers were busted based on how much energy they used. The new smart meters can pick up individual devices based on their usage patterns. It can tell how many lights you are running, what kind, when, etc... All of this information is already being analyzed and used to catch people.

It's worse than that actually - any of these connected things may ship with malicious components that turn against you or the network at large:

http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-24707337

At some point, seemingly innocuous devices might be able leverage access to ambiant sounds and shared AC circuits to compromise local wireless networks in unconventional ways.

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