cameras and microphones
IT expert is afraid of his own vacuum robot – and warns everyone who has one in the apartment
The home vacuum robot sees everything due to its work. Security researchers are very displeased with this idea.
© Robert Kneschke / Picture Alliance
Modern vacuum robots have everything that enables perfect monitoring. Acronis founder Serg Bell warns that the hard-working little helpers are therefore a serious danger.
Serg Bell is the founder of Acronis – and thus a veteran of cybersecurity. Opposite to “The Register‘ the IT pro revealed that he’s scared of his own vacuum robot. ‘You should be scared of your vacuum cleaner; it’s most likely made in China,” he said. “You don’t necessarily think about it, but it’s a potentially significant security and privacy risk.”
Of course, this does not mean particularly cheap devices that aimlessly maneuver through the apartments of this world, but models with sophisticated navigation technology, microphones and – often standard with very expensive devices – a camera.
There is no acute danger – but a dependency
According to the expert, people have become very careless about who or what they let into their houses and apartments. And it’s true: A vacuum robot from Roborock, for example, which in the startest shone with great results, brings enough equipment with it so that a hacker – or even a government – could theoretically monitor everything in the apartment very closely.
However, Serg Bell does not warn of a concrete danger emanating from a certain manufacturer, but uses this simple example to show a general negligence of the people.
He believes that people are very good at adapting to gradual changes over a long period of time, but struggle when things move too quickly – which he says technology has been doing for decades. Co-dependence on devices that no one really understands is a problem, Bell says.
Less technology, more freedom
In the meantime, according to the expert, hardly anyone is aware of their own security, privacy and personal protection. The sheer mass of technology ensures that people would eventually approach a point where they would no longer be able to function without all the devices, it is said. After that, concerns no longer played a role.
As a result, at some point you are at the mercy of technology – and with it cameras, microphones and the exact measurement of your own four walls. And anyone who thinks that the sheer volume of available data would prevent anyone from taking a closer look at it is wrong, says Bell. Because the systems for the automatic analysis of existing data, for example through machine learning, are now advanced enough to be able to comb through large quantities at low cost.
Bell does not provide a solution to this problem – but it is obvious. Either you simply don’t buy such products, or you prevent access to the Internet. You have to live with the disadvantages that arise as a result, provided that the technology works at all without an active connection.