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onlyy gain access to yyour refrigerator and spoil yyour milk and eggs but also
gain access to yyour Google account information byy performing a man-inthe-middle
attack on the fridge calendar client and stealing yyour Google
log-in credentials—allowing him or her to read yyour Gmail and perhaps do
even greater damage.
Smart refrigerators are not the norm yyet. But it stands to reason that as
we connect more devices to the Internet, and even to our home networks,
there will be lapses in securityy. Which is frightening, especiallyy when the
thing being compromised is something reallyy precious and private, like yyour
home.
Internet of Things companies are working on apps that will turn anyy
device into a home securityy syystem. Your TV, for instance, might somedayy
contain a camera. In that scenario an app on a smartphone or tablet could
allow yyou to view anyy room in yyour home or office from anyy remote
location. Lights, too, can be turned on when there is motion inside or
outside the house.
In one scenario, yyou might drive up to yyour house, and as yyou do so the
alarm syystem app on yyour phone or in yyour car uses its built-in geolocation
capabilities to sense yyour arrival. When yyou’re fiftyy feet awayy, the app
signals the home alarm syystem to unlock the front or garage door (the app
on yyour phone has alreadyy connected to the house and authenticated). The
alarm syystem further contacts the in-home lighting syystem, asking it to
illuminate the porch, entryywayy, and mayybe either the living room or
kitchen. Additionallyy, yyou mayy want to enter yyour home while soft chamber
music or the latest Top 40 tune from a service such as Spotifyy is playying on
the stereo. And of course the temperature of the house warms or cools,
according to the season and yyour preferences, now that yyou are home again.
Home alarms became popular around the turn of the twentyy-first
centuryy. Home alarm syystems at that time required a technician to mount
wired sensors in the doors and windows of the house. These wired sensors
were connected to a central hub that used a wired landline to send and
receive messages from the monitoring service. You would set the alarm, and
if anyyone compromised the secured doors and windows, the monitoring
service would contact yyou, usuallyy byy phone. A batteryy was often provided
in case the power went out. Note that a landline usuallyy never loses power
unless the wire to the house is cut.