Expanding Vulnerability of the Net

Rei asks: "The recent article by Jane's left me contemplative. The recent commercial trend seems to be to put everything online - from cellular phones to refrigerators to toasters. These devices have their software typically non-upgradable. An increased number of systems in a particular location, with increasingly diverse operating systems, with real-world effects, places an increased danger from crackers in the future. Imagine the effects of a script kiddie finding a way to extinguish a pilot light in a heater, or to cause a fire in a device like a toaster or coffee maker. And do sysadmins really have the time to do a firmware upgrade in all the air conditioners or elevators in a building, let alone virtually every mechanical device which industry sees fit to give an IP? Before the greatest physical damage that could be done was to flash a BIOS so the machine wouldn't boot. But now we have oncoming the capacity for much, much more. How will the world deal with it?" This has worried me for a while. More often than not, the drive to commercialize a new tecnology always comes before we've accurately predicted how it will effect us. So how will millions of potential network security holes affect us in future when everything is networked?

Comments

Most things can easily be made updateable...

[moller]

Most chips nowadays are in-system programmable, meaning someone just has to hook something up to them and upload the new program, software, whatever. If the machines are all wired together (most likely not wired, but wirelessly connected) then theoretically it should be easy to upload new information to them. Just like updating drivers on your sound card.

There's been discussion of this movement before, some people have dubbed it "Ubiquitous Computing." I know that Xerox's PARC facility is doing something with this, and we just had a building here at Caltech dedicated to the idea of Ubiquitous computing. http://www.caltech.edu/~media/Press_Releases/PR119 93.html

It's going to be cool. They're talking about putting a large transceiver on top of our largest building, giving palmtops to every student, and having wireless internet access to anyone with a direct line of site to the transceiver. We do this, then move on to toasters :).

Embedded devices

[Chemical Serenity]

I never understood the desire to put your coffee pot/armchair/lufa sponge on the net. What purpose do they serve? You have to get up and get the coffee anyways, why bother with having it hooked to your computer?

The simple fact is this whole embedded appliance thing is a toy idea. Briefly interesting, of limited usefulness, and ultimately will be discarded as embedded devices start crashing left and right, or screwing up in a variety of entertaining and lethal ways.

The only people making money in net-enabled appliances will be, IMO, the early entries marketing to those rampaging toy-driven geeks who'll pay top buck... although IANAEAM (I Am Not An Embedded Appliance Marketer).

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rickf@transpect.SPAM-B-GONE.net (remove the SPAM-B-GONE bit)

Re:Embedded devices

[mochaone]

There wil probably be some useful applications but they primarily won't happen in the family home. I mean, do we really need to microwave dinner 5 minutes before we get home while driving on the turnpike. The devices will turn up in places for hotels, office buildings...places that naturally lend themselves to networking. Security will definitely be an issue as you've mentioned.

Re:Embedded devices

[Chemical Serenity]

Ok, so you get home late from the office...

Silly rabbit! People will telecommute in the future, or just teleport around! ;)

... and when you pull into your driveway your porch light turns on and the vcr (or digital HD thigy that replaced it a few months ago) gets ready to play back the news of the day that you told it to from the office when you saw something of interest on slashdot.

This is happening already with such things as TV/DVD/Computers all coming together as one "information appliance". This could be the only real use for net enabled applicances and really, when we've already got most of the above with a puter with video cap card and DVD, *IS* the only net enabled appliance we've got right now.

The above idea does intrigue me though. Maybe I'll try doing some scripted video capture onto a new 27GB HD via my BTTV. I smell open source VCR replacement for those peeps with big HDs. ;)

As you get out of your car it begins to recharge itself form the docking station built into your garage and downlaods the audio notes you were dictating on the way home to your computer where they are converted to nice document form and ready on your desktop to do whatever you want with them.

Recharging: Not needed to be on the net.

Audio Notes: Another information appliance. Probably best handled by something like the upcoming cell phone/pager/palm pilot fusion dealies, or 'wearable computing' items which we've all been assured are coming Real Soon Now® from people like this collective of ubergeekiness.

I could see the transcription now:

... Persuant to our clients' interests, I recommend that we acquire JEEZEZ FUGGIN' CHRIST YOU MORON, STAY IN YOUR OWN GODDAMN LANE! Why am I always trapped on the road with DARWINIAN REJECTS!!!! God damn... now, where was I... oh, look, that figures. Some moron with an ancient cell-phone. TRY UPGRADING, IDIOT!...

Ahhhh... technology is a wonderful thing, n'est pas? ;)

...then you go inside, watch the news while checking your e-mail with the remote. then you set up a client meeting and tell the oven to make your favorite dish all without getting up from the cozy couch.

You're going WAY beyond simple net connectivity with that sort of idea. You're looking at a large scale robotics issue, which would be far more expensive, and not much faster, and almost certainly less palatable than simply ordering out. You don't have to get out of your chair then either.

sound good? no? well to assloads of ppl out there it does and that means $$$ for all the companies that do it first. when it comes down to it, it's all about the benjamins.

Sure. It's just highly impractical, and terribly expensive in the case of automation, and unless you're an engineer or humanity suddenly is able to produce flawless technology, rife with annoying and potentially dangerous breakdowns and glitches. I also don't see a compelling reason to enable my lightbulbs to talk to me on the net, unless perhaps I want to do my own interpreting when the aliens from Close Encounters come buzzing by my home.

Don't get me wrong, I can understand and agree that for information appliances (phones, puters, entertainment devices etc) there's a definate upside to being net-enabled. I just don't believe that there's a compelling purpose to tracking your toilet usage via syslog, or any real need to ping your blender.

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rickf@transpect.SPAM-B-GONE.net (remove the SPAM-B-GONE bit)

Re:Embedded devices

[Chemical Serenity]

That pretty much encapsulates my theories. They'll be big for a brief time, while the 'toy fascination' slowly wears off. Then it'll crash and burn for the masses, leaving only the die-hard geeks and the people who can really use such items (disabled peoples, perhaps? I could see voice command of common appliances being very handy for helping the visually impaired around the house...)

--
rickf@transpect.SPAM-B-GONE.net (remove the SPAM-B-GONE bit)

Possible scenario

[Barbarian]

Toasters are not typically even on timers right now...but currently we use timers on stoves. I'd be surprised to see toasters with IP's, since automatic startup/shutdown is useless. But ovens/stoves would be common.

So extend it further. You can hook your electric oven/stove up to your home computer network and control it turning on and off. This is course is so that roast you stuck in it will cook for 4 hours while you are not paying attention. You control everything from your handy PC that you got prepackaged from a store.

So it's Windows NT (the computer) and the stove is on embedded linux. Someone has broken into your computer (due to bad security ACL's and user stupidity--let's say a trojan is installed). (Insert another operating system in place if you like, and change trojan to "race condition" for example).

Now the stove might have all sorts of safeguards. But let's say that your computer is connected to the internet (cable modem) and a second network card connects to your home network. Now that the attacker is into your network, he can send stuff to your stove. But the built-in safeguards prevent problems (i.e. high temperature override shutdown, etc).

Now after he's had access for a few weeks, let's say a linux problem is found. Some psychopath goes over his list of compromised home networks, and looks for everyone with a Stove running some particular variant of linux (or whatever). Now he goes and sets them all on permanent self-clean mode. If you are not home, and don't notice it, your house eventually catches on fire.

Of course this is exaggerated. Any properly designed appliance will have thermal fuses and stuff not subject to computer control. Just don't get complacent and assume that computer controlled sensors and controls can replace these.

Re:Technology will find its denominator

[pq]

People will wait till it matures or is safe.
And what planet are *you* living on? :-) People love to stick their necks out, and will do anything and everything they can to get something that might make their lives easier... Do you really think we'd have automobiles and airplanes in the numbers that we do now if everyone waited for technology to mature before they embraced it?

No, people will adopt any half-assed technology at all if it promises to reorder beer when supplies run low and defrost the turkey when the car lets the house now that you're at the right exit (and though you were yakking on your cellphone, it will cut in to remind you to turn off)...

Now that also opens people up to virtual hijacking (okay, maybe not) and truly intrusive snooping (hmmm, the beer's disappearing fast - and the fries - turn up his insurance rates and lock his car till his BAC comes back to legal...) and moronic software crashes (imagine warm flat beer after your fridge goes BSOD). Oh well.

I was going somewhere with all this, but I no longer remember: sigh.
Oh, wait - people are stupid and willing to be led wherever Oprah tells them is a cool place to go. And wherever Bill thinks is a cool place to go today. Yeah, that's what I was going to say...

(Time to feed those squirrels in my brain.)

A typical family scene in 202X...

[Cookie3]

Yeah, I can just imagine it...

Flashy future-fade sequence

A husband and wife are sitting at their dinner table, eating a nice computer-cooked meal when this conversation pops up on their monitors...

Husband: "Honey, did you remote admin that lamp over there?"

Wife: "No, dear, I didn't... why?"

Husband: "Well, it looks like someone changed the lampshade... Oh no!"

Wife: "What is it? Did the computer undercook the food? .."

Husband: "No! Some stupid scriptkiddie defaced our lampshade! Now it's an ugly orange... but our carpets are blue! Argh. Curse those lamers. Computer?"

Main Computer: "Yes?"

Wife: "Nevermind him. He just doesn't have a sense of style."

Husband: "Style? What's STYLE got to do with it? Computer, change the lampshade back the way it was before."

Wife: "But, dear, you never back up ANYTHING. Remember, the Hou$eOS is just the default install? Things like backing-up aren't part of the package."

Husband: "Argh. Curse those H$ people. Curse them for owning a monopoly on all the houses of America."

End preview of future

Ok, it's a little skewed, but you get the idea.. I think it's a scary idea -- putting EVERYTHING on the net.. and quite possibly deadly one...

But to avoid things like this -- simply DON'T put your stuff on the net. :P If you don't want a scriptkiddie to deface your lamp, don't put it on the lamp. Don't let the companies FORCE you to put it on the net, either.

If, for some reason, you need to put your lamp on the net, make sure you do a CUSTOM installation.. don't let the factory just install the defaults. :P

Fight the man. Don't let H$ 0wn your h0use..

pr3s3nt d4y... pr3s3nt t1m3.... hahahahahahahahahaa

Re:A typical family scene in 202X...

[Relforn]

Actually, do put your house on the net.

And vote in a political representative not afraid to spend a few tax dollars on jail cells for criminals who engage in trespass.

Why do people feel the need to make it more complicated than that?

How to Identify and Deter the Problem People

[Anonymous Coward]

Most sys admins are vigilant in checking systems for signs of cracking attempts. However whenever you find evidence of an attack in your logfiles, isn't it frustrating that the people responsible are almost never caught or even identified?

What is the best form of deterrence against these attacks?

Since we cannot eradicate insecure systems globally, we could at least make the process of identifying these people more certain and reliable. One idea would be to have a central website where registered sys admins could report the IP addresses of attackers, at least in cases where this information is available from the logfiles. If enough people were to do this, it would be possible to trace through the chain of compromised hosts used by the attacker(s) to hide their origins right back to the source host(s) -- the original hosts used by the attackers.

There are several potential problems with this approach, not least finding websites willing to host the attack tracing service. Firstly, not all computing environments would favour the idea of admitting publicly that a system had been compromised. In such cases, the only publishable information might be the attackers' IP addresses and approximated dates of attacks. This would still be useful. Secondly, the logfiles might have been deleted by the attacker(s), although in practice it seems this rarely happens and would be impossible in cases where backup records are kept securely and non-electronically e.g. on paper.

Does anyone have any examples of successfully using a tracing approach to find attackers?

There was a post on Slashdot a while back listing IP addresses from an attack but there doesn't seem to be widespread use of IP address publication as a tool for deterring and identifying attackers. Should the big security sites like CERT expand their operations to provide a public tracing service?

Signed, 5fa1079617ec5584e8980fea39529b33

Cracking Bill Gates' Computerised Mansion

[B.D.Mills]

According to an earlier Slashdot article, Bill Gates has "spent untold millions building a vast, digitally-controlled mansion". Now I wonder how much of this house is vulnerable to intrusion?

If someone broke into Bill's house electronically, they might be able to do these nifty things:

• Change the art on the walls to pornographic images.
• Burn his toast.
• Make the house lights flicker at the exact frequency that causes epileptic seizures.
• Make his stereo play pirated MP3's. And then dob him in so he gets sued by recording companies.
• Make his shower run too hot. ("What's the name of that movie ... something, something, A Space Odyssey?" "2001 - Yarrgh!")

Shouldn't be too hard to do. He's probably running NT as a server, and NT isn't exactly secure....

(Postscript: I had to type this in twice. The first time, Netscape and my Windows PC crashed so hard, I had to press Reset. Coincidence? Or did the words "Bill Gates" trigger a crash-and-burn subroutine in Windows?)

--

Hey what's wrong with grandpa's NetPacemaker????

[gad_zuki!]

When will the urban legend of 'connecting your toaster to the net' die? Who makes this gear? Who would buy it? No one.

This is such a non-issue its almost funny that people worry about it. You've been reading too much William Gibson.

We can call it the "Maximum Overdrive Meme." or MOM.

"Looks like some hacker flushed the toilet when I was taking a shower again."

Why should I network my fridge?

[Mr_Plow]

What startles me the most, and seems outright unnecessary and unusual is the desire to actually HAVE some of these things networked. Why do I need my fridge networked? Why? It's not networked now and my food stays cold. All the time. Every day when I come home and open my fridge, the stuff inside is cold. And the one time that it wasn't, it was due to a mechanical problem. And guess what... that would have happened even if it had wireless networking installed. The only difference is that I would have known sooner that I was going to lose $50 worth of groceries because my fridge would have emailed me when the temp. dropped a certain amount.

I want someone to please explain how networking every appliance in your house is going to improve life in a cost per effort scale. I wake up in the morning and spend 3 minutes preparing coffee before I start getting ready for work. Get beans out of fridge, grind beans, pour into filter, fill carafe with water, empty carafe into percolator, turn on percolator. Now, that's three minutes.

You could make the argument that a person salaried at $50k would save $1.20 per day by not making coffee manually, but guess what? Your employer doesn't pay you to NOT BE AT WORK! And I'm pretty sure that 90% of everyone in the world would use that extra 3 minutes of their time to hit the snooze button an additional 1/3 times. I'm in favor of progress, but I must object to the technologically absurd, if only from a pure fiscal standpoint. Networking your kitchen appliances will not make you happier, more efficient, or more productive. It will only ensure that you have less capital in your bank account.
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Re:Why should I network my fridge?

[Weezul]

Why do I need my fridge networked? Why? It's not networked now and my food stays cold. All the time.

No, silly.. it's because Enlightenment needs to know you have beer in the fridge when it compiles. I know Geoff (Mandrake) pretty much always had beer in his fridge when he lived in Atlanta, but I have had to go out and buy it once or twice when I upgraded E.

Seriously, people will not bother with things like fridges.. unless they had some sort of bar-code scanning inventory device, but even then it wouldn't need to control the temp.. But some people will use other network controlled things. How many of you use cron/at for your allarm clock now? Hell, I even use atjobs insteal of setting the timer for the stove. It's kinda nice to have a unix like control of more of your world.

Security issues will probable have been worked out by the time personal things work there way down to the general public.. especially since the more dnagerous devices, like stoves, will be some of the least useful things to have on the network.

The only real problem I would expect to see is people hacking into networked phones or home security systems and spying on people.. it would be VERY useful to have a computerized phone or home security system which queued up say 30min. of footage and sent it to the cops if something happened (or was in gernal programable).

Prediction: We will see some hacking of systems at busnesses (ex: why not make elivators programmable so that the exec can cal them from his office and not need to wait) and we will probable see some privacy invasion (hell there is porable someone reading this who has evesdroped on another door room using someones soundcard).

Jeff

When it all comes down

[HamNRye]

This entire argument seems a bit premature to me. The tech/software field is still moving at a much faster pace than appliance makers. So my main point would be this: If IP enabled appliances rolled out the door tomorrow, how long before the acceptance grew? Sure, I'm as much of a geek as the next guy, but having to pay $15-20 more for a coffee pot that lets me regulate the burner temp doesn't sound like all that great an idea. And I would be willing to bet that the combo of NIC/FIRMWARE/SOFTWARE is going to add more than $15-20 to the price at least initially. Now lets figure in the impact of those who do not have a NIC in their home PC, a hub for attaching the toaster, etc...

So the question comes back: How long until we really see these devices in use? A long time by my count.

My VCR has an RS-232 port, and I do use it to set up a recording schedule. How many of the "truly geeky" have done this? RS ports on VCR's are also about 3 years old. (Maybe older, I said 3 to be conservative.) Is my VCR hackable? Yes, but what true damage could be done? ($50 in fees for my tapes being "not rewound"! Darn you hax0rs!!!)

Why hasn't anyone hacked my VCR and forced me to record "Emmanuelle in Space" over my copy of "Titanic"? (Actually, why haven't they darn it! My IP is...) Because noone is looking for it. Why doesn't someone out there write Macro Viruses for Ami-Pro?? Because they would have too little of an effect. Linux is still short on viruses, but they're coming...

So, until a hax0r sees the likelyhood of being able to hack your toaster, and figures it's likely that you have an IP enabled toaster, he/she will probably spend most of his/her time writing Office Macros that make your paperclip sing "I'm the only one".

I firmly believe that we will se a proliferation of TIVO and similar devices long before we see the CompuToaster (TM).

So, back to our original premise, IP enabled devices today. Plan on at least 3-5 years before there is enough market saturation to matter, and another 2 years for acceptance.

Where will the computer industry be in 5-7 years? What steps will be taken by M$, Linux, etc. in that time frame? Ask anybody that was using Linux 7 years ago if Linux has "changed".

It is becoming inevitable that within the next 3-5 years a competent firewall will be a part of every major operating system simply as a side effect of cable modems and the like. Believe me, the OS that does not have this feature will soon add it when the kids down the street decide it's best to hack your computer for practice. I recall that not too long ago there was no Virus protection on Windows. Along came MSAV, and you basically can't buy a computer without AV software installed nowadays. The market responds to new challenges.

Also, TCP/IP would be too much of a networking protocol to use for a toaster. There will probably be an updated version of NetBios, NetBeui, or SMB that will be used.

Debating a technology that is so far off into the future without considering the impact of a similar timeframe of advances in other fields is fruitless. As an earlier poster commented, "...will have safety precautions built in, like a temp control for the stove..." The hardware will not debut until the software is ready, and so on. In a country where you can sue someone for serving you coffee that is "too-hot", I must assume that the companies involved will make sure that they are protected from liability. Leaving a security hole in a program that in turn causes your Braun Shaver to shave the sofa and set it on fire would probably stand up in court as negligence.

********Paranoia Starts Here***********
Here's the real kicker. GE enters into an agreement with some monolithic OS maker and makes the CompuToaster (TM) a proprietary "OS 2000" only product. Sure, write your own interface, but we ain't responsable when you have a burnt loaf of wonderbread... Better yet, the makers of "OS 2000" decide that a "partnership" is in order, so that GE develops the toaster and firmware, and OSsoft develops the interface. It takes a level of responsability from both parties, as they can blame software/hardware (whichever side they didn't design) for any and all problems that occur. Sure, you could still sue the companies, but which one?? This would be great for both sides of the bargain, and as usual screw the guy in the middle. Just something to think about.

Will Bill control the destiny of your toaster??

~Jason Maggard
"If all you have is a hammer, try 'ln -s /dev/hammer /dev/nailgun ; /dev/nails > /dev/nailgun ; ! /dev/nailgun' It could work..."

Re:Firewalls

[RobertGraham]

The BlackICE Defender intrusion detection system is pretty darn easy to setup on a windows box, though it isn't nearly as flexible as something like ipchains for Linux.

The funny thing is, even though its only for windows, it detections a lot of intrusions for Linux, like the infamous rpc.mountd or numerous POP and IMAP exploits that only Linux is susceptible too (of course, it's really meant for the TONS of windows exploits).

Imagine having to have an intrusion detection system to thwart:

• "sink overflow" when the hacker turns the faucet on and leaves the plug in
• "toaster denial-of-service" when the hacker makes the default time 1-hour for toast, which not only denies you a nice pop tart in the morning, but also triggers the fire alarm.
• "fridge spoofing attack" which attempts to redirect the auto-grocery system (which detects when you are out of something and orders more) so that the hacker can send free coke and pizza to himself

My kitchen just crashed.

[EdlinUser]

MY KITCHEN JUST CRASHED
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

TCI, The nation's largest cable television company, is in talks to launch a
unique pilot project in conjunction with Pacific Gas & Electric Co. &
Microsoft Corporation to design a "smart home". The home automation industry
is expected to triple in size, from $1.7 billion this year to more than
$5.1 billion by the year 2000.

NOVENBER 28, 1995 - Moved in at last. Finally, we live in the smartest house
in the neighborhood. Everything's networked. The cable TV is connected to our
phone, whitch is connected to my PC, whitch is connected to the power lines,
all the appliances and security system. Everything runs off a universal
remote with the freindliest interface I've ever used. Programming is a snap.
I'm like totally wired.

NOVEMBER 30 - Hot stuff! Programmed my VCR from the office, turned up the
thermostat and switched on the lights with the car phone, remotely tweaked
the oven a few degrees for my pizza. Everythings nice and cozy when I arrived.
Maybe I should have the universal remote surgically attached.

DECEMBER 3 - Yesterday, the kitchen crashed. Freak event. As I opened the
refridgerator door, the light blew. Immediately, everything else electrical
shut down - lights, microwave, coffee maker - everything! Carefully,
I unplugged and plaugged all the appliances back in. Nothing called the cable
company (but not from the kitchen phone). The utility insists the problem was
in the software. So the software company runs some remote telediagnostics via
my house processor. Their expert system claims it has to be the utility's
fault. I dont care. I just want my kitchen back. More remote diagnostics.
Turns out the problem was "unanticipated failure mode". The network had never
seen a refridgerator bulb failure while the door was open.
So the fuzzy logic interpreted the burnout as a power surge and shut down the
entire kitchen. But because sensor memory confirmed that there hadn't actually
been a power surge, the kitchen's logic sequence was confused so it couldn't
do a standard restart. The utility guy swears this had never happened.
Rebooting the kitchen took over an hour.

DECEMBER 7 - The police are not happy. Our house keeps calling them for help.
We discover that whenever we play the TV or stereo above 25 desibels, it
creates patterns of micro-vibrations that get amplified when they hit the
window. When these vibrations mix with with a gust of wind, the security
sensors are activated and the police computer concludes that someone is trying
to break in. Go figure... Another glitch: whenever the basement is in
self-diagnostic mode, the universal remote won't let me change the channels
on my TV. That means I actually have to get up off the couch and change the
TV channels by hand. The software and the utility people say this flaw will be
fixed in the upgrade - Smarthouse 2.1 but it's not ready yet.

DECEMBER 12 - This is a nightmare! Theres a virus in the house. My PC caught
it while browsing the public access network. I come home and the living room
is a sauna, the bedroom windows are covered with ice, and the reffridgerator
has defrosted. The washing machine has flooded the basement, the garage door
is cycling up and down, and the TV is stuck on the Home Shopping Channel.
Throughout the house, lights flicker like strobescopes until they explode
from the strain. Broken glass is everywhere. Of course the security sensors
detect nothing. I look at the message slowly throbbing on my PC screen:
"Welcome to Homewrecker!!! Now the fun begins. Be at ever so humble, Theres
no virus like Homewrecker..." I get out of the house, FAST!

DECEMBER 18 - They think Iv'e digtally disinfected the house but the place is
in shambles. Pipes have bursts and we're not completely sure we've got that
part of the virus that attacks toilets. Nevertheless, The Exorcists - as
the anti-virus SWAT members like to call themselves - are confident the
worst is over. "Homewrecker is pretty bad," one tells me, "but consider
yourself lucky you didn't get Poltergiest. That one is really evil".

DECEMBER 19 - apparently, our house isn't insured for viruses, "Fires and
mud slides yes," says the claims adjuster, "Viruses, no". My agreement with
the Smarthouse poeple explicitly states that all claims warranties are null,
and void if any appliances or computer in my house networks in any way, shape,
or form with a non-certified on-line services. Everybody's very sorry but they
can't be axpected to anticipate every virus that may be created. We call our
lawyer. He laughs. He's excited.

DECEMBER 21 - I get a call from a Smarthouse sales rep. As a special holiday
offer, we get the free oppertunity to become a beta site for the company's
new Smarthouse 2.1 upgrade. He say's I'll be able to meet the programmers
personally. "SURE!!!" I tell him.....

---aurthor unknown

pipe dreams

[MillMan]

There is a place for networking...the toaster is not one of them. Cell phone and other communications technology is another issue, but here I'm talking mainly about physical appliances with embedded controls.

I think I've seen this discussed here before. Lets face it, toasters are never going to have IP's. There is no point. Perhaps being able to control your lighting, and a few other things remotely would be nice. Stuff like this is available already (X10 type stuff) if you're willing to pay the price, albeit not with IP's. A lot of audio magazines cover this type of stuff, Home Theatre comes to mind.

Lets keep it real for a moment. Is it just me, or does the whole "give your toaster and everything else an IP" sound like something some dumb ass executive at GE would say? How soon will this be a real problem or a real market? Maybe 5 or 10 years down the road for the 1% of the population that can afford it? Frankly there isn't much in my house that I'd want to be able to control remotely other than my computer/data.

Any consumer with half a fuctioning brain will do a cost/benefit analysis and see that networking your entire house pretty much fails. High cost, and large security risks for minimal gains. How lazy do you really want to be? "Hey honey, I just warmed up the oven while sitting on the couch!" Yawn. Most of this stuff I'll leave for the rich who do it "because they can." Let Bill Gates get his house "owned" if he's actually dumb enough to connect it to the internet.

The person who asked the question on this topic also pointed out that most of these devices are not upgradeable. Indeed, any embedded system you buy most likely isn't How many appliance manufacturers would you trust on this point, especially since the average consumer has no idea what we're talking about here anyway? "Sir, this security is unbreakable. The food in your refridgerator will be safe." Where have I heard something like this before? Ah yes. Witness the recent events in DVD land. Even the suits were convinced that it would never be cracked. Yikes.

A lot of this stuff has important applications, for example in building control, for security systems, air conditioning, or whatever. But this already exists in a LAN environment. Changing this type of system to some sort of PC and TCP/IP environment is not a huge step (in the local or MAYBE WAN environment). As far as connecting all this to the internet only sets you up for disaster. So what if you can control all 10 of your building from one location...just pay a few extra people to work at all of the building and save the security risk.

So I'm not worried about this in general because:

The cost is too high.
Doesn't do much for you (mostly more couch potato stuff, at least in the home environment).
Only a small percentage of the population will be able to afford it.
Once these type of systems are cracked, the average consumer will reject them.

Technocracy

[BBB]

I don't know much about embedded technologies or their feasibility (though I do agree with those who wonder why on earth one would want the fridge connected to the net).

No, what I was most interested in was the comment appended to the story, which went like this:

"This has worried me for a while. More often than not, the drive to commercialize a new technology always comes before we've accurately predicted how it will effect us..."

Think about this line for a moment. Ignore its immediate silliness (OF COURSE people want to commercialize things before their effects are known... how else do we get to know their effects?!).

Imagine a world in which no technologies were permitted to enter the market unless someone (who? Slashdot? A Federal Bureau of Technology Approval? Bill Gates? Some committee with reps from all of the above?) approved it, presumably judging what its effects would be.

This is the technocratic fantasy, wherein nothing new is permitted unless it fits a particular "expert" vision. But who, really, CAN predict these things? Who could have predicted the creation and rise of Linux? Who could have predicted the Slashdot effect? Maybe some people did. But if those people had had to persuade everyone else, or at least a majority, that those effects were (a) likely to occur and (b) had benefits outweighing their costs, neither would have happened at all.

That is why the mentality embodied in that sort of offhand comment -- fear about unleashing some sort of technological monster upon an unwary public -- scares me, because it demonstrates an amazing level of arrogance about our own knowledge and predictive capabilities. If the capacity exists for a wired fridge, someone will try to market it, and it will succeed or it will fail. And it may produce effects and innovations that even we vaunted Slashdot readers could not have predicted. So when we express our healthy skepticism about a particular technology or product, let's try not to let it spill over into technocratic hubris, eh?

(note for readers: there is a rather good book on this subject entitled The Future And Its Enemies, by Virginia Postrel. Check it out if you are interested in a recent nontechnical defense of technology.)

-BBB

That bugeyed paperclip

[dattaway]

...the papercip pops up and asks, "can I watch?" and promptly pipes /dev/video to a streaming port on the webserver's homepage. Meanwhile, all those who view http://www.microsoft.com/billshome stare in slackjawed amazement. Its a tiny fscking paperclip.

"You mean it wasn't really IIS, but that 'fringe operating system?'"

Funnily enough..

[Otto]

This link was on UserFriendly this morning.. :)

http://www.furryspace.com/istapler.jpg


---

Yet another apple blunder . . .

[hawk]

Yep, another chapter of the apple saga, in which they prove that if you buiild a better mousetrap, you can still beat the world away from your door.

It's not the net that's useful for connectivity, but the home. Let the computer cycle the lights when you're away. Turn on the coffee pot. Change the channel on the stereo. Turn off the light downstairs that you forgot about.

And why is this apple's screwup? Turn the clock back 11 years. Apple produces the Mac IIfx. Recall that every mac since day one was network capable. In the IIfx, the serial (network) ports were run by a special chip with a 6502, RAM, and ROM. Gee, one little chip, that apple could sell for about $20 to embed in everything . . . that could communicate around the house over the unused pair of wires in the phone lines (yes, appletalk ran on common phone wire). So how many did apple sell outside of the IIfx? [hint: it's the same number as North American coal exports in 1491 . . .]

Maximum Overdrive Meme has you!

[gad_zuki!]

Yes, thats how you should have read my post as a metaphor. Where is the market for people who want to attach appliances to computer networks?

Controling your lamps through your pc has been available for YEARS, yet you never see it. How often do you change the temp in your refig? Once a year? Why waste tech and $$$ to wire it? Why put a chip and a couple servos to flush your toilet for you.

Its an urban legend that such technologies exist or are being taken seriously. The bill gates house will never catch on. Why? Because housing will always be traditional. One, its expensive to build a home from scratch and most people buy/rent used. And new home buyers don't want to chance some untested technology for obvious reasons. "Hey for 3 grand we can make the oven take commands form Hawaii!"

Especially when radio shack sells light timers for next to nothing.

Practicaly, its of almost no use to wire your home to anything other than a small upgradable control box, like electonic thermostats today. Why would you want make it net accessible, on the off chance that your 2 weeks vacation every year comes at a time you can't find someone to feed the dog? Or you really need someone from Hawaii cook you a roast.