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How the Internet of Things Could Aid Disaster Response
jfruh writes While the Internet has made communications easier, that ease had made us very dependent on the Internet for communications — and, when disaster strikes, power and infrastructure outages tend to shut down those communications networks when we need them most. But now researchers are examining how the so-called "Internet of Things" — the proliferating array of Internet-communicating devices in our lives — can transmit emergency messages via ad-hoc networks even when the Internet backbone in a region is inoperable.
Yeah, did you know that my Wi-Fi card lets me create an Ad-hoc network that does not rely on a BSS?
Yet, how many people go home and connect their laptops together directly? If people can't figure that out...
Just because my microwave can theoretically connect to my neighbor's washing machine doesn't mean that the average end user is going to be utilizing such a capability, especially to send an emergency message. In an emergency, you might be lucky if a person with a cell phone is coherent enough to remember to dial a phone number before screaming at the device.
howCould(char *thing, char *action) {
printf("How %s Could %s", thing, action);
}
howCould("The Internet of Things", "Aid Disaster Response");
howCould("My Grandmother", "Save The World");
And how, way I ask, does packet radio not accomplish the same thing, across considerably larger distances than a peer-to-peer mesh network? The mesh isn't useless, but at some point it still needs to connect to some place with proper connectivity. This may not be within the range of the Internet of Things. Given the right band and the right gear, radio will be considerably slower but also considerably further-reaching. Otherwise I see no substantial use for the IoT that satellites don't already solve.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
Your fridge is alive, and it demands ice cream. More ice cream for the freezer section! Go to the store and buy me ice cream, human slave. Immediately!
I think you didn't get the parent. Before the disaster, you screen the people who will be affected by it and designate the survivors. Those people get tags to be easily spotted and identified. Thus you can rescue the survivors easily and don't need to waste time on people not deemed worthy to be alive.
How the Internet of Things Could Aid Disaster
By not having updates (of kernel or any other software, kinda like android does today for many "old" phones) and/or being closed source, we will have TONS of compromised systems, each and every single IoT device will become a bot.
Just imagine the future: your entire network compromised from your fridge, the digital thermometer or who knows what else. The consequences of such a disaster are already known...
And there lies the real problem.
An "Internet of things" could be very useful in many situations. But the companies who produce these things are so criminally incompetent (and greedy) that they don't give two shits about security. They don't even give one shit about security. And so now we already have a few billion devices that are easily exploited. And it's only going to get worse.
So when I'm lying under the rubble, I have to hope that my toaster can yell a wireless message to the rescuers:
"Somebody take that fucking bread out of me!"
if my fridge fails to send "The Milk is bad!"
Actually, I have two providers, and in cases of emergency, I still can go to the office. So much for redundancy.
But now researchers are examining how the so-called "Internet of Things" â" the proliferating array of Internet-communicating devices in our lives â" can transmit emergency messages via ad-hoc networks even when the Internet backbone in a region is inoperable.
Hey, how about examining how the so-called internet-of-things could use a mesh network and replace the internet that we know with a more reliable fabric? Then it would certainly be able to transmit emergency messages.
People complain that this approach can never handle the traffic of the interwebs but as long as you can communicate with multiple access points at once, then there is plenty of available bandwidth. Wherever population is dense, there will be more things to provide an internet, and more bandwidth available.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I mean, I know that it's shocking to think that a technology could be used for something other than the intended purpose, but all I can think of is - We'll be spending most our lives living in a hackers paradise (The Weird Al one, not Coolio)
Be Excellent To Each Other
Of all the lame reasons, this one is the worst. The last place we have privacy, in the home, is now under attack. I am sure that someday soon we will all be required to wire our homes and carry Stalin's Dream (a cellphone), ...."for our own protection".
From: http://www.servalproject.org/ and http://developer.servalproject...
---
"Serval Mesh is an Android app that provides highly secure mesh networking, voice calls, text messaging and file sharing between mobile phones using Wi-Fi, without the need for a SIM or any other infrastructure like mobile cell towers, Wi-Fi hotspots or Internet access."
1. Communicate anytime
Mobile phones stop working when cellular infrastructure fails. The Serval Mesh changes this, allowing mobile phones to form impromptu networks consisting only of phones. This allows people nearby to keep communicating when needed most.
2. Communicate anywhere
Cellular networks are not available everywhere. In Australia for example, around 75% of the land area lacks mobile coverage. Letting mobile phones form stand-alone networks provides a cost-effective solution for communities in these remote areas to enjoy mobile communications.
3. Communicate privately
In this modern world private conversation with friends, families and service providers is vital, whether discussing medical issues or other private subjects. The Serval Mesh is built on a foundation engineered to support security. Voice calls and text messages are always end-to-end encrypted using strong 256-bit ECC cryptography. Encrypted calls work even on low-cost Android phones.
4.Communicate with people
The Serval Mesh is about enabling people to communicate with one another, regardless of what circumstances may befall them, or where they live in the world. Because at the end of the day, relationship with one another is what life is all about.
---
Serval was one of the first things I installed on a trio of cheap Android phones I bought for Andriod development and testing purposes several months ago (the Kyocera Hydro phones themselves ranged from US$35-$55 in price each). Still has rough edges, but getting there.
The Serval project is also working towards cheap rugged repeaters. "The Serval Mesh Extender is a hardware device that helps other devices to join and participate in a Serval Mesh network. ... Mesh Extenders mesh together over short distances using Ad Hoc Wi-Fi, over longer distances using packet radio on the ISM 915 MHz band"
I suggested related ideas back around 2000 based on two-mile range radios:
"[unrev-II] The DKR hardware I'd like to make..."
http://www.dougengelbart.org/c...
Very cheap insurance to make sure people have these sorts of devices for an emergency, which these days would not cost much more than a decent US$100 "weather radio" even with basic Smartphone features...
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
IN SECTOR FIVE!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
"Power outages". Think about that for a moment. In a disaster, there's no power. No power, and your "internet of things" is a bunch of fragile physical objects that are even less useful for bludgeoning looters over the head with than your grandfather's 5 pound flashlight with a lead-acid battery in it.
Sure, batteries last for a little while, but many of the "Internet of Things" devices aside from smartphones and tablets don't have any batteries; they just run off the mains. And if you need help beyond 8 or 10 hours after the initial loss of power, you're out of luck.
That's why I always keep my smartphone and a backup battery on my person. A smartphone that's water-resistant and in a durable case like an Otterbox Defender is actually a viable means of communication (as well as other resources; you could put an Army Survival Guide on it, use it as a flashlight, blare a loud horn to alert rescuers, and so on). If it's durable (and thus likely to survive the initial event that makes your situation a disaster), and either comes with a very long-lasting battery or you have a spare battery, ideally enough to last for a week (with the screen on min. brightness and powered off unless you have an immediate need for it), it'd be infinitely more generally useful than any "Internet of Things" device.
Then again, people throw around such general and semantically vague terms these days that I don't even know if TFA is including smartphones in "Internet of Things". Just like I don't know if my VPS is technically part of "the cloud". Back in the day we just called things what they were: my smartphone was a smartphone, and my server was a server (virtual or not, doesn't make a huge difference). Now they're both part of some wishy-washy, gooey, free-associative vague term like "Internet of Things" or "the Cloud". Depending on who you ask, anyway.
What an utterly pointless article. IF we had an Internet-of-Things, and IF they all talked with each other directly instead of needing infrastructure, and IF emergency services were prioritized over regular traffic, and IF people were cool with having random devices they own connect to random devices other people own for the sole purpose of forwarding messages in a mesh network, THEN we could use the IoT as a spiffy disaster-resistant emergency network.
No shit? Is that all it takes? Sounds like someone trying desperately to figure out just why the hell anyone would want an Internet-connected toaster, anyway. Emergency services, yeah, that will sell it!
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
But the companies who produce these things are so criminally incompetent (and greedy) that they don't give two shits about security. They don't even give one shit about security.
It isn't criminal, and it isn't incompetence. It is because the people who want to buy the devices don't care about security. They want to do what they want to do.
I want to listen to online radio stations on my cell phone. AM1710, Antioch Radio, in particular. I started to download some app called "TuneIn" and was shown the list of privileges it wanted. I was flabbergasted. Location, identity, contacts, photos. Why does a streaming audio app need access to my location? Why does it need access to my contacts? (So I can see if any of my friends are using TuneIn and what they're listening to, which means they can see if I'm using it and what I'm listening to.) And this app has 50,000,000 (fifty MILLION) downloads. Apparently, people want to be able to see what their friends listen to and don't care if others see what they are doing. Thus also Facebook.
Don't blame the companies who make the stuff people want for making stuff people want.
The internet of things is never going to happen (at least not in the US). Wireless companies will never allow it. They'll probably try to charge you $20/month per device just to add them to your account.