Founder of cybersecurity firm Acronis is afraid of his own vacuum cleaner
- Reference: 1664793969
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2022/10/03/acronis_founder_smart_devices/
- Source link:
"You should be afraid of your vacuum cleaner; it's most likely made in China," said Bell, adding that the vacuum cleaner is connected to the internet, likely has a camera, a microphone, and a map of your apartment. The vacuum cleaner thus collects all of the data, allegedly for your benefit, but there's no way of knowing exactly how that data is being used and what it is ultimately capable of.
"You don't necessarily think about it, but it is a potentially significant security and privacy risk," said the former cybersecurity firm's CEO.
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According to Bell, humans have a general lack of awareness of their safety, privacy, and security when it comes to the sudden proliferation of smart devices.
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Humans live in the world of biological species, well designed for gradual changes over the long duration of evolution, but exponential changes are different, says the Russian-born Singaporean, and that's what worries him.
The entrepreneur elaborated:
What happens in the world of data, the world of computers, and the world of knowledge is there is a lot of exponential changes. And one of those changes is that devices are exponentially smarter every year, every month, and there is exponentially more of them. And we are exponentially more dependent on those devices.
Bell began to look around his high-rise office in Singapore's central business district pointing out all the different items in the room that are actually computers – from the television, to a phone, to a watch. But because these devices are typically in homes, said Bell, people get complacent with them and are lulled into a false sense of safety. Even worse, humanity is approaching a point where one can't function in society without them.
Case in point: the smartphone.
[4]Backup biz Acronis ascends to unicorndom after $147m splurge led by Goldman Sachs
[5]Inflation, recession, pah! IT budgets set to rise in 2023
[6]OVH opens less flammable datacenter at site of 2021 fire
[7]Atos investor says turnaround plan 'too ambitious and complicated'
But about this data – will anyone ever be able to meaningfully sort through the mass quantities being generated?
Yes, said Bell, thanks to machine intelligence, which is only expected to accelerate in capability and accessibility:
You run the machine intelligence on a fast enough compute cluster, which is readily available. And then you can extract it. So the idea that nobody has time is no longer correct.
The machine has time, and it's very cheap. And it's getting cheaper every day.
He also feels metaverse hype may be overblown, because we're already in it, referring to it as "the sixth sense of the body."
"We are living in the metaverse in the fact that we're digitally connected," said Bell, pointing out that he can call his fiancée while she's shopping in a building nearby or his daughter in Switzerland in an instant, although it's not yet mainstream to be represented by avatars sitting in digital chairs.
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Bell gave up his role as CEO of Acronis in 2021 and now serves as the company's chief research officer and executive board member where he controls vision, strategy, and the board.
His overall vision is for Acronis to become an institution, like IBM or Google, complete with oodles of patents and charity endeavors, like building schools in rural areas of Southeast Asia, and teaching cyberskills to inmates exiting Singapore's Changi prison.
The company is also affiliated with a private non-profit computer and software science institute in Switzerland. The Schaffhausen Institute of Technology (SIT) was founded by Bell in 2019, the same year the company [9]rose to unicorn status thanks to a $147 million funding round led by Goldman Sachs. ®
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[1] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YzsHH3KICi0fTxlwzmfjrQAAABQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YzsHH3KICi0fTxlwzmfjrQAAABQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YzsHH3KICi0fTxlwzmfjrQAAABQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2019/09/18/acronis_147m_funding_round_goldman_sachs/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2022/09/27/it_budgets_2023_inflation_recession/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2022/09/13/ovh_sbg5_opens/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2022/09/12/atos_sycamore_investor_criticizes_turnaround_plan/
[8] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YzsHH3KICi0fTxlwzmfjrQAAABQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2019/09/18/acronis_147m_funding_round_goldman_sachs/
[10] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
He's scared of his vacuum cleaner? my tumble dryer has wifi.. that seems less than useful given you have to be standing right by it in order to load it up with stuff to dry
My washing machine has WiFi. I thought this would be absolutely pointless but it turned out to be useful. My daughter has a habit of coming over to our house using the washing machine then forgetting and going home leaving a machine full of her washing. Now I get a notification (even when I'm away on holiday) that the washing cycle has finished so I can message her to empty it.
Of course the notion that a nation
might have in place various subtle initiatives to ensure data that is sent back to China is absolute garbage is a possibility.
And if they don't, I have.
Re: Of course the notion that a nation
The servers that receive this are [cough][cough] perfect for a DDOS. If enough of them are taken down, we might rethink the need for this.
I am not advocating a DDOS but it is one possibility out of many that could be employed to keep our data in our homes and not given/sold to ad slingers and criminals around the world.
The same goes for these Alarm systems that seem to be advertised every few minutes on TV. The receivers of all that lovely data would find ut very easy to build up a picture of your habits, when you are at home, when you go out and for how long for. Why isn't that in itself a security risk that is not plastered all over those adverts?
Acronis founder Serg Bell is afraid of his own vacuum cleaner
So, he's stupidly purchased a vacuum cleaner that is an internet connected surveillance device and has become paranoid. Should have bought a henry hoover instead (although can he be sure those eyes aren't following him around the room?). Personally, I think that the sum total of all the masses of data that's being snooped only really adds up to show that everybody leads very boringly similar lives. But if he has developed a theory that it will cause a catastrophic information apocalypse instead, he's entitled to that opinion. Perhaps he hopes the theory of the information end times will be named after him. We could call it the Bell End.
Re: everybody leads very boringly similar lives
Just give me six uploads from the appliances of the most honest of men....
.
:-)
No need for AI for a smart vacuum
The price and power of jellybean ARM processors nowadays means that really the kind of "AI" required to negotiate your rooms could easily be hosted on the device. Certainly, the cost of a processor powerful enough to run an embedded Linux kernel, IP stack, application logic, and a Wifi adaptor (plus all the back-end compute) can't be much different from adding a bit more RAM and some learning code?
Re: No need for AI for a smart vacuum
Ah, but there is money to be made in raping your privacy, hence the WiFi link irrespective of any real need...
Re: No need for AI for a smart vacuum
That's the problem with them Smart Vacuums - AI or no AI they still suck.
There's another side to this
We all live in an environment filled with Cellphones, WiFi, and Bluetooth radiating all the time (24/365), so we are living in a low-power microwave cooking world. Could this be a problem in future or, maybe if the Earths magnetic field collapses when it reverses in the future, will we be ready for a few years of intense solar radiation?
If you are worried about devices in your home sending data out, then setup a WiFi firewall connection with a bandwidth limit of 1200baud (a return to the old days when data was virtually never stolen) - this is a potential solution, not a joke (LOL).
Here's A Thought
Put stuff like this on the guest network.
My vacuum cleaner is not connected to the internet, it does not have a camera, a microphone or a map of my apartment. It's a fecking vacuum cleaner.
Nor is there a single microphone or video camera in my apartment that is listening all the time or uploading anything anywhere. Alexa and her like are banned. Google Assistants are turned off. Webcams have covers. And, I've never heard from Cortana even once.
Privacy. It is simple and easy if you take the time to set things up correctly.
Sadly, privacy isn't simple or easy - it's a goddamn chore. *You* had to cover those cams, *you* had to turn off the voice assistants, *you* had to turn off tracking or install a blocker, etc. And anytime there's an update you get to play wack-a-mole on the settings that reverted back to non-private (for your convenience natch.)
Privacy should be the default setting, not something you have to dig down into configurations to find.
" the vacuum cleaner is connected to the internet"
Why is the vacuum cleaner connected to the internet?
Ironic then that the very internet itself is in fact the largest vacuum cleaner ever imagined!
Sucking up all our personal data crumbs every second of every day!
Everything seemes to be 'Smart' these days
In most cases, I just equate Smart to 'the spy in your home that you paid good money for'
These things are designed to 'phone home' all the time. Unless you are pretty network savvy, you are stuffed. All that lovely data is uploaded to the mothership and there is little that normal people can do to stop it.
I won't have any of this [redacted] shit in my home. If there is no choice then I will simply not connect it to my network. anything that stops working because it has to be connected will be returned for a full refund unless there was a big notice saying 'In order for this device to function properly it must have an active internet connection'. Has anyone seen any of those notices? I haven't...