If you think about it, its really now only about 2 more
months till Christmas time. The weather
has been so nice and warm, that is hard to believe it is going to happen. So, as the thoughts of gift giving and being with
family friends start to emerge, the question of what to shop for becomes front
and center.
The holiday shopping season is going to be an interesting
one this year, driven by the fears inflation and as COVID-19 has more or less
dissipated from the headlines.
For example, will people still shop online, or will they
make a tour through the brick and mortar?
What kinds of gifts will people choose to give away? Here, there are two common answers: Gift cards and cheap electronic devices. There is nothing wrong of course with the
first choice, but it is the latter which is more gut wrenching for the Cyber
professional.
Some of the more common reasons for this is if it was made
in China, or if it is a device which can be interconnected with others, which is
also known as the Internet of Things or IoT, for short. It is the latter which resonates the most
level of fear.
Bluntly put, we are not at the level yet where devices can
be connected safely together, without the fear of a malicious third-party
prying in.
We do not know how secure the other devices are, and in
fact, many of the wireless connections themselves are often insecure, which only
expands the threat landscape that much more.
But there are so many IoT devices out there, at first glance, it is
almost impossible to know what is safe to buy as a gift and what is not.
Well, the following is a broad sampling of those IoT devices
that you should avoid buying as gifts for others this holiday season:
*IoT Cameras:
CCTC cameras are all over the place and all over the world, whether
people like them or not. But they do
have their highly valued use, as law enforcement agencies have been able to
apprehend suspects quicker now even more so than before. But, CCTV cameras have become much “smarter”
now, coupled with the use of Facial Recognition and Computer Vision
technologies. At the present moment, all
of these cameras operate in a standalone mode, but there is talk now to connect
all of them together, so that one continuous video fed can be seen, rather than
having to view one reel at a time. While
this is obviously great for law enforcement in the real world, putting in
interconnected cameras in your home is a bad idea, due to the fact that
security measures which have been supposedly put into them have not even been
tested yet by the vendor.
*Smart Toilets:
OK, laugh as much as you want about this, but this technology
does actually exist today, and is even used in Smart Homes. I don’t know why one would have to worry
about security here, but scientists here claim that the sides of our backs have
a unique, biological trait to them (just like a fingerprint or iris) that can
potentially be used for identification and verification scenarios. While this concept may work in other
countries, it will not go too far here in the United States for reason alone:
The invasion of privacy rights. In fact,
according to a recent survey, 20% of Cyber experts fear that their Smart Toilet
could be hacked into, and 30% of the other respondents would not even consider
using it. More information about this survey can be seen here at this link:
*The Digital License Plate:
While digital technology has found its to some degrees in
drivers licenses (for instance here in IL, many drivers licenses now have some sort
of Biometric technology implemented into them), the hope is that they will
eventually find their way onto our license plates. While this sounds extremely convenient, like
not having to wait on end at the driver’s license branch, it does pose a number
of serious Cyber risks as well. Probably
the biggest one here is that they can still be easily replicated and
forged. At least with our drivers
licenses we have control over them, but with license plates, we do not. What is out there to prevent anybody from
taking a picture of our license plates at 2AM??? Having this kind of technology in place on a
large scale can also stoke the fears and even realities of Cyber stalking, at a
point when we really don’t need that right now in our society, given all of the
horrific crimes that are already taking place.
*The Smart Speaker:
This type of IoT device has been around the longest. For example, when you speak with Cortana or
Siri on your smartphone, this is an example of a smart speaker application. But there are also versions of this which are
far more sophisticated, and which you can install at your home. You can still speak into the speaker, but the
results are far more powerful. For example,
you can ask Siri or Cortana to turn on the TV, your coffee machine, or even ask
your robot to do certain things. But
once again here, there is a huge security risk here, especially with the vendors
of these IoT devices actually listening in onto the conversations that you are
having.
*The Smart Kitchen:
Thoughts of automated stoves and microwave ovens are often
conjured up here. While personal and confidential data cannot really be hijacked
here, the Cyberattacker can easily play with the controls on them so that they
will not work when you need them the most, or even turn up your oven to such a
high level that it will become a grave fire hazard, without letting you turn it
down.
My Thoughts On This:
Personally, as much as I love writing about Cyber, and that
I even do have an advanced degree in MIS, I hate technology. There is nothing “smart” where I live at, and
I intend to keep it that way. Heck, I
still drive a very old Honda Civic which so far has withstood the sheer extreme
changes of Chicago. But that being aside
the point, given these security risks, should you still give an IoT device as a
gift?
That is really up to you, but if you are going to go down
this route, make sure you warn your gift receiver about the risks, and above
all, one of the most the important things that they should reset the security
setting thresholds to what they think is safe.
Many vendors still leave it at the default settings, which offers
no security at all.
Or perhaps the best and least complicated way to give away
gifts is to merely just send gift cards!!!
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