Internet of Things? Not a sure thing!
Recently there's been a whole lot of talking about Internet of Things and the possible wonders it could deliver for us.
A necessary premise: I deeply hate this term, along with all the fad words created by marketing people who don't have a clue about IT.
Internet of Things doesn't mean a thing in IT. If we want to say something meaningful, we should talk about "Internet of Hosts".
Why this definition? A host is any device connected to a network having an IP address, and the Internet is but a network, more exactly a WAN, or Wide Area Network.
Does it make more sense? Probably, but people don't want to understand things, they only want to fill their mouths with fad words to show they stay current.
Marketers keep sharing the same stuff online, with the equivalent effect of a wave of sewer water rippling in circles.
Not me.
Almost nobody seems to have in mind the security implications of all this. We keep adding devices to the Internet making a network, already essentially insecure, yet more complex to handle.
We keep registering security breaches with regards to computer networks. What makes you think that adding a car, a washing machine, or an industrial plant it is more secure to handle than a computer?
Networks weren't created having security in mind as a primary consideration. They were mostly developed in colleges to allow people exchanging information and researches and, only in a second stage, when hackers started messing around with it exposing the fallacy of this architecture, security started being important.
Sadly, as my grandpa used to say, life is made of cycles and we're seeing the same mistakes over and over again. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a Luddite, technology is my job but I think we should learn from our mistakes instead of replicating our history.
What if our car, our furnace or a nuclear plant malfunctions or gets hacked? Science fiction scenario?
Not at all, if you think of the Stuxnet virus.
If you think the scenarios described in a movie such as "I, Robot" are sci-fi paranoia, I remind you that 20 years ago video conference was science-fiction, and now we can call anyone anywhere in the world, seeing each other without spending a dime. Machines (at least for now) do what men tell them to do and make errors because we make errors.
Of course, nobody will tell you this because they gotta push their products.
There is also another underlying consideration that is widely overlooked: Big Data.
People are happy to hand over their personal information by wearing devices like Apple Watch, thinking companies are making their lives easier. They don't probably know they are making companies yet wealthier than they are.
Our data is gold for both companies and government agencies. They know more and more about us, even what they shouldn't be entitled to.
They know what we could do and what we could buy, which diseases we could suffer in the future and if we could be dangerous to them or not.
Most people don't get it but they are outraged to learn that the NSA monitors US citizens. I find this paradox pretty laughable.
That's why I don't have a Facebook profile and I'm not interested in creating one, for example.
You want to have my personal information? Pay me for it!
I don't deny that in certain scenarios big data can make a difference, such as in medical research.
I am not personally ready, though, to blindly trust companies whose main goal remains profit.
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