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Irrigation Controller Stolen, Wirelessly Rescues Itself
wooferhound sends along an amusing piece about thieves who got run over by technology and never knew what hit them. "A Rain Master Eagle-i Irrigation Controller recently stolen out of a housing development just outside of Tucson traveled nearly 80 miles before rescuing itself. The smart controller is now back in place on the wall where it was originally pinched... In this day and age, something that may look passive like an irrigation controller may not be so passive. The thieves didn't realize they were removing equipment that features 2-way wireless communications via the Internet. Three weeks later, the unexpected happened. The Maintenance Supervisor noticed a signal coming in from the stolen controller. He thought it was kind of odd that it was up and running... Whoever had stolen it had plugged it back in."
Thieves will now have to block the antennae of their purloined plunder. But how's this for an idea: geo-locking hardware like this? "Here's your GPS coordinates. Stray outside of this area, you stop working." Thieves will soon learn that taking something like this will brick it.
I also like the idea of equipping cars with wireless stuff like this. The owner reports it missing, the car starts reporting its location to the cops and they can nab the perps.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
It's not at all that simple. There are probably an array of moisture sensors in the field that provide data to the closed loop controller, which in turn controls an array of valves to various irrigation rigs. A PLC or PID controller like this probably costs on the order of $10K and may interface with a product like ExperionPKS or other supervisory DCS platform.
how they will visually identify the stolen property, call it in, and then leave and expect it to just stay there until they get back with more badges.
I've read about this scenario repeatedly, though this is the first time I've heard of it being voluntarily returned later. Being that stupid about it they didn't deserve to get it back.
Putting on the "wild speculation" hat, I'd say that since they were obviously tipped off, that it was likely whoever was sent out to identify the item was told to leave by his commanding officer, who then tipped them off "we're coming back in 30 minutes and it better not be there when we return". Gotta love how things like that work in rural towns. Any competent law enforcement would have left the stolen property under observation until the badges showed up.
I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
What concerns me is that someone knew the police were coming for the unit. This was almost a petty theft case, sure significant to some but not really a major crime issue.
What if it were a more serious case? The police here should be really concerned about their information leaks and integrity of their investigation system.
Yes, the wireless telco in this case is the one who did the rescue'ng. This was a very misleading headline, summary AND article. The perfect /. trifecta.
Modding Trolls +1 inciteful since 1999
And things are going to go increasingly in this direction as microcontrollers capable of this sort of thing get cheaper and cheaper, and IPv6 could help too.
Microcontrollers are only starting to reach the sort of scale that this kind of functionality can be cheaply tacked onto anything, it's the start of true ubiquitous computing.
// MD_Update(&m,buf,j);
Sort of. If it wasn't for the controller automatically initiating a call, the cell tower or whoever wouldn't have been able to do anything.
You might chalk this up in the same sense that a passing motorist who witnesses an accident and phones for help saving the occupants of the car because of the efficient arrival of rescuers. Sure the person who phones in didn't do anything to stop the bleeding or keep the drivers heart beating but getting people who could do that there fast enough could have played a significant role in their survival. In this sense, there would be no cell tower, IP address or even communications to the former owner/monitor to suggest that it could be found.
I agree that the summery and article is a little misleading and over blown but it isn't flat out misleading or outragous.
The company has a patent on controlling the sprinkler system remotely. This kind of patent is stupid and evil.
You're only jealous because you didn't have the idea of taking out a patent on remotely controlling a sprinkler system by means of a manually operated rotary or other valve within the fluid delivery system at a position other than the sprinkler apparatus itself (=a tap at the other end of the hosepipe).
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Anyone else read the article and thought it smells a lot like it was written by the PR department of the company that manufactures those things? Lots and lots of talks about the great and unique features of the device, very little details on the alleged crime.
If this were ZiiTrend, I'd vote 70:30 that the story is fake and PR.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I'm surprised I only saw about one other comment pointing out that this whole thing is most likely fake. At best, it was a real story that was published by marketing department for the parent company.
I hope it was at least something real that they chose to embellish and propagate. In either case, it all feels rather sleazy.
If you have doubts - read the story again and notice how many times the article has to mention the company that makes it by name, and how often they have to tout the various features of the device.
Why don't grow lawns in the desert? They provide a vital function of producing oxygen, cleaning the air, lowering the heat island effect and are often areas used to recharge underground aquifers. Having a lawn in the desert is good for everyone.
I think the idea is sort of like the laws against false advertising. If I'm in trouble and run to where I've 'seen' a camera, so actions against me can be witnessed, I'd be pissed if it turned out to be fake and there's no video evidence of my being assaulted.
But, approach it from a different angle - the very appearance of security cameras deters crime, maybe. On the other hand, odds are fake cameras will eventually be found out, then the public will be operating on a false sense of security. Not good.
Oh, and going by crime statistics, the cameras in London don't do much good - you're worse off than NYC! I've read that cameras, at most, shifted crimes. Many times the perp would commit the crime right in front of the camera counting on the fact that a random cop or victim looking at the camera isn't going to be able to identify him - there's just too many faces. Thus the push for face recognition software. Then that gives you hurdle 2- you now know who perp Y is, but now you need to find out where he's living this week and actually send an officer around to arrest him. Police departments everywhere seem to fall down a lot on the second one. As studies have shown, actually following through(even if you 'don't have enough resources') tends to disproportionately reduce crime - after all, that purse snatcher, burgler, or mugger is very likely have committed crimes in the past, and commit more in the future if he's not caught and subjected to an effective correction*.
*Chosen over punishment. I don't care as much about the retribution portion as the 'make sure they aren't going to do it again'.
I don't read AC A human right
Obviously, the thief who didn't know about the hardware phoning home also wouldn't have known about the theft protection and taken it anyway.
I fail to see how the tenant could successfully sue the apartment building owner. What grounds?
False advertising. The tenant may have chosen to rent from that landlord based partly on the assurance that the cameras provided some security, but the landlord bought fake cameras to save money. The landlord failed to provide a service for which the tenant paid every month.
Sounds like these controllers are even smarter than that. Sounds like it can download weather reports, be hooked to remote sensors, etc, and run in open and closed control loops with this data.
Now, I'm not sure how smart all these adaptive features are, but ideally, this would mean the remote management would be more for monitoring, than managing . . . sounds pretty slick, especially for large installations (think city's with lots of parks).
You can expect this kind of quality detective work from any police department. This is why Justice wields a sword and not a scalpel.
The Admin and the Engineer
Look, if you live in an area where there is shrinking water resources and generally arid conditions there is one simple solution:
Move to Vancouver.
We have lots of water falling from the sky, all the time.
If you get nostalgic for the desert just drive 4 hours to Kamloops and you'll be back amongst the sagebrush.
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
Evidently you guys didn't read the entire article, because the thieves returned the unit after three weeks due to the police attention. So the ISP triangulated the unit, the police scouted the location, the farm owner got wind of the heat and hid the evidence, the the farmer got rid of the hot equipment by returning it to the location they stole it from.
The most interesting thing is that it sounds like the farmer hooked it back up to the water and electrical systems when they put it back. Talk about a conscientous thief.
So yes, the device in essence rescued itself becase it screamed for help and brought so much attention to its location that the thief returned the device.
My money is that the story is a fake.
It reads like a fluff piece and mentions the company by name too many times. Even better, since the story does not talk about any arrests, the alleged crime is untraceable. No one can go around and ask questions if no police records exist.
My guess would be that someone decided to disconnect a controller for a few days, filed a missing report , then connected it back and then went out and wrote this story up about it.
http://slashdot.org/submission/1062723/Cheap-mobile-data-plan?art_pos=2