Proliferation of smart devices in homes is premature... due to security concerns.
It's fine to slow walk your way into using these, as long as you stick to devices that clearly cannot be hacked to give up information about you (like smart lights)... but resist the urge to proliferate "assistants" in your home and be very diligent with your use of WiFi and proper security protocols. In particular... never share your WiFi with friends and neighbors.. and if you feel you must have WiFi for visiting friends.. make sure it is separate and isolated from your internal ethernet/WiFi network.
It's not that hard for a neighbor, a mobile hacker, and especially a "friend" to pick their way into your home if you leave any gaps in security. And digital assistants are a particular concern as they have microphones and camera devices built in and if they get hacked and the information is out in the wild... it will get vacuumed up by the FaceBooks of the world.
Be careless at your own peril.
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“I can walk in and hit the top button and know it’s on the setting where every light in the apartment goes on to just the light level that I like at night — everything is dimmed to make the perfect martini,” he said. “The second one is for the housekeeper: Everything goes on super-bright."
Finally, the answer to a persistent, major problem in my life. I realized I had the housekeeper working under martini lights, and was making martinis as though I were a housekeeper! How foolish of me.
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Chris, you have written either the best comment here—or the worst.
I’m going with the best.
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I drive one A4, 6 cylinder 2002 Audi, love it, have CD and tape player and radio waves to listen to NPR whenever I wish
Get taken care of yearly at the dealers.
I do have to turn my head to look back, and side and front mirrors.
I was told to get a new one with all the smart gadgets right at the dashboard.
What for ?
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I can't afford to go to the gym, so I get up and do all the fabulous things that my not very smart house demands.
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Do a quick search on "nest microphone" and you will see why so many have concerns. I do like my Sonos system though.
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@T Same here - love Sonos, not sure about Nest. Even though I have a Nest camera in the kitchen. I originally bought it to keep an eye on the dogs...which proved to be pointless. Spolier alert: They appear to sleep 20 hours a day.
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Not emphasized enough - security. Any device that can be reached from outside the internet, or can reach the internet, is a hole in the dike waiting to be opened. The firewalls need to be smarter about how they let traffic pass. For example, only an IP address whose reverse lookup leads to a pre-established URL confirmed by secure certificate should be allowed. Much work to be done - don't go hog wild unless the advantages outweigh the potential invasion of your network.
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@Bruce Maier Agreed. If you have a "professional" set up your hub/core system, all of that is a simple and standard configuration consideration. From there, consumers can get as fancy or as basic as they choose.
For those concerned with using the internet via your wi-fi to control your home becoming a potential security risk, know that there is a rapidly growing alternative that can either use the internet--OR NOT--to set up your smart home: Hubitat. For a rather geeky but highly entertaining video quickly explaining its range of possibilities and limitations, I recommend Mr. Hibbert's video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLy0MOpSbmI
or, of course visiting the much more banal but informative website of the company producing this most interesting product.
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I hear that "they" want to put a wired device into every home so that by contacting an "operator" anyone can create a ringing alarm in your home which will only stop when you are forced to respond to it. This device will allow complete strangers the ability to speak to you day or night! This will also require you to be known by a number. Also, the government can use this device to listen to what you say to others.
Sorry, I won't be adding this so-called "telephone" into my home. I'm sticking to call cards and hand-writing letters.
(NY Times Letter to the Editor: April 2, 1899)
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So, you need dimmed lights for martinis and your housekeeper needs bright lights for cleaning. If that so that he/she can see all the mess and do a really good cleaning job for you? No better comparison came to mind, like maybe someone needing bright lights for reading?
My wife and I live in a very smart house where everything is controlled by 2 retired PhDs. Long ago we were programed to turn lights on and off as needed, we learned how to operate our thermostat for comfort and energy savings, and we operate all manner of household appliances and gadgets with our own two hands. Furthermore, over 43 years ago we learned how to communicate with each other, so we have no need of a Google/Amazon gizmo to replace one another.
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@Nick As a Millennial, I respect this. And frankly, I don't want all of these expensive devices in my house. I can use my hands to adjust my thermostat and turn a light on before I leave in the evening. I might be old fashioned, but I agree with the retired PhDs.
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The article touches only briefly on a major concern: privacy. Once connected to the internet, virtually any component is hackable and in some cases, can be made into eyes and ears into the privacy of a home. Personally, I'll take hard wired systems and local control over internet-enabled remote control and its potential for invasion by bad actors.
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This sounds lovely for the people who want it. As for me, I have two issues:
1. Excessive phone use (Twitter!) is numbing my fingers and hurting my neck.
2. According to research on sitting, it's going to prolong my life to get up off the couch and do these things the old-fashioned way.
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The best way to take care of lighting is LED bulbs with PIR built into the bulb - about $4 each from AliExpress. These turn on if it dark and you enter the room and off after 30 seconds after you leave the room (or are inactive). Use the KISS principle!
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I can't help but wonder if a smart home is worth the trouble and the cost. Do I need to control my lamps with my smartphone when a timer will do it nicely and at much less cost? Ditto the thermostat, door locks, garage door opener, etc.
In fact, as one grows older, moving around to open and close window treatments, change thermostats, and lights is helpful in keeping the body in shape.
If I were physically disabled, I might want a few of these products, but overall they are not worth the cost or the risk.
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@Barbara It depends on the size of your home. Easy to turn off a few lights in a small apartment. Becomes more cumbersome in a larger home with outdoor spaces. I also love being able to turn down the lights without getting up when I'm snuggled on the couch with my kids or after reading them books at night before bed.
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One gets addicted to convenience and then finds reasons to defend its necessity.
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@Karen Green One gets addicted to inconvenience and then finds reasons to defend its benefits. Either way, change is quite a challenge.
I am a septuagenarian and I admit that I am a bit of a Luddite. I have 4 apple devices but my idea of a smart home is my programmable coffee maker that I can set to have my coffee ready before I come downstairs in the morning.
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The one "smart" product I actually want is a way to crank the heat for my increasingly-elderly parents at their weekend cabin so they don't need to hang out in down coats for three hours once they arrive. I've seen internet-connected thermostats which should allow remote management of heat. But they require a power source, and I can't find reliable statements about what happens is the power fails (as it often does) - is there just no heat at all? Are we looking at a frozen-pipes disaster? Anyone have an idea?
@Happy Don't all thermostats require a power source? I installed Nest thermostats. If I lose power, I lose heat, but that was the same with my old thermostats also. Once the power comes back on, everything resets assuming the internet router comes back on and resets also. Most modern furnaces need electricity to turn on, and zone valves, water pumps, and fans all need electricity to run.
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I think the concern is, if power is lost on a computerized thermostat, does it reliably reset to the prior temp when power returns? Or could it reset to a too hot or too cold setting?
@Happy
Honeywell has (had) device that would “speak” in response to different touch tones. Press 1 for temperature, 2 for system status (heat, cool, off) etc. The device connects to a landline and we use it just as you described. While on route to our weekend retreat, we call when an hour or so away and set the desired temperature, avoiding the discomfort of waiting for heat or air conditioning.
“Starting with one piece is the way to go,” Mr. Spates said. “I started my journey with a single smart plug.”
That allowed him to turn a lamp on and off using an app. “What you’re doing is taking a very logical step that solves a problem,” he said,
--
If only there existed some device that could solve this problem. Something that could, say, toggle on and off.
Physically ensconced in a wall nearby the plug. It would never get lost or misplaced; perhaps even integrated within this 'circuit' so it would always work (even if the batteries and app software failed!)
Alas, such magic doesn't exist today.
Maybe beyond this dull horizon in bright tomorrowland...
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Most of these smart home products are plain stupid. For the record, I love (meaningful) technology.
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I do not understand the love for Sonos. And it's not just the NYT -- everyone seems to love them. Why? The interface with applications like iTunes and Amazon music is very clunky and frequently doesn't work at all, particularly if you shuffle music. And podcasts! Forget listening to those on Sonos. They often randomly skip back to the beginning.
I've read that the clunkiness is not the fault of Sonos -- that Apple and others make it hard for them to build smooth interfaces with their applications. That might be true but regardless of who's to blame the net result is an end user experience that is far, far less than optimal.
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Getting up and moving to do a task is exercise. Controlling home devices by voice command or simply your presence is docility. Get up and move - you’ll live longer.
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@Ben If I get up, the dog steals my spot on the couch. Besides, we already walk three to five miles a day. But if I forget to turn the thermostat down before leaving for work, I can't just get up and change it. With the ability to program multiple schedules, I no longer have that problem.
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@Johnson02118
A programmable, non-smart thermostat solves the temperature problem. The dog I can't fix.
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I just had a home built last year and used 50 Lutron wireless switches and dimmers (including a lot of LED tapes) Very nice to have one button shut off - from any where - and to turn on a lighting scene with one button. Internet access also to Honeywell Thermostats, garage doors and solar panels. I chose not to install cameras and security - no need where I live now. This is about as smart as I need my house now (oh yeah and a Eufy cleans our floors nicely)
Spotify and Utube also seems smart enough to chose music for me with a little guidance.
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Before anyone invites Google’s “smart” hardware into their home, they should read “The Age of Surveillance Capitalism” or watch some of Shoshana Zuboff’s (author) interviews on YouTube and elsewhere. When you bring Google’s smart appliances into your home, the amount of private information you will “voluntarily” share with the world is far beyond your expectations.
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A "smart home" is for those who
1. Do not mind living under the eye and ear of the Big Brother;
2. Are too soft and lazy to move a limb or muscle to do something
mechanical;
3. Do as the naive, electronic-technology-addicted Joneses do.
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My "smart house" devices (at the moment I have a Ring doorbell, 2 Feit light bulbs; and 2 smart outlets) are connected to a guest network rather than my main wifi, so they are at least a little isolated from my personal data. At the moment I use 1 light on a daily schedule (set with the phone) that illuminates the living room through the evening hours. The other light and outlets are currently on reserve, but will replace vacation timers and such. The smart outlets were obtained from Amazon and run on their own app, and cost about the same as the vacation timers they're replacing, and they're easier to set schedules on than the plug-in timers.
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"having to get up to turn the light off becomes a real annoyance"
Getting up to turn the light off is good exercise. We all know that sitting in one place for a period of time isn't good for us. So one should consider the getting up to be a positive thing, and not an annoyance.
The other problem I see is these people come home and turn on a variety of lights at one time. To set the mood. Better for the environment to only turn on a task light for what you are doing at the time.
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If we are annoyed by having to turn on a light, think how annoyed we will be when the power grid fries from 120 degree days and superstorms as global warming swamps our wonderful technology.
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I'm 64 and while a little geekish, I enjoy the benefits of some of these devices. Our Ecobee thermostats are fantastic and managing out heating and cooling and our Google Mini's make a few tasks easier. I can still manage our lighting manually.
Are we getting hacked? Probably, but well before any of these were invented OSPI, Target, and Equifax had already mishandled our data and "provided" it to the Chinese, Russians and the deep web, so I don't lose much sleep over losing more of my personal data.
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Just more gateways for hackers...
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Check with your internet provider to see if it supports your system. Comcast no longer supports Nest.
@Meri As someone who has Nest and Comcast, this just isn't true. Nest connects to your wifi like any other device like your phone and laptop.
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“Back in my day, we actually leaned over to turn the light off and on. And we liked it!”
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A Smart House is one that will perpetually need an upgrade and iseventually fated to be unsupported. The Passive House, https://g.co/kgs/tu7ufk, is more likely to be future proof.
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And do any of these devices actually save electricity?
Are any of them environmentally friendly?
How long will they work? Will we have to have huge dumps for all
this fancy equipment?
Will they save any money or power in the long run?
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@memosyne You are asking the right question. I think these devices are mainly about convenience, e.g., while watching an advertisement-free movie streaming from your smart TV, not having to get up to turn up the thermostat or turning off the light you left on in the kitchen. In fact, unless your home is super insulated, a thermostat which is set to turn the temperature upp and down can actually cost you money. I have found that my NEST thermostat is best used to keep the temperature in my antique home set at a constant level as the recovery time from a low night-time setting or an away setting is actually more than the cost of maintaining a set temperature.
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@memosyne
I have been installing smart technology in homes since 1985. I don't know for sure if they save electricity or are environmentally friendly, but my guess is that for most uses not really. It's more of a convenience factor.
Early on these features fell into more of a hobbiest category that required programming expertise, and most homeowners needed to call someone when they broke. Today that's not the case. Switches I installed in houses in the early 2000's still work and interface fine with modern networks. What's happened is that in the early 2000's those also required programming knowledge, while today the programming is built into modern bridges and apps.
I'm sure it all becomes irrelevant at some point, but then again so do a lot of things.
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I work in SecOps. I know how vulnerable these devices are to penetration by those who are malicious, as well as by those who are merely mischevious.
Thanks, but no thanks.
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@Bleu Bayou Agreed.
Several tech companies have been my clients. Have been working with these technologies for nearly 2 decades.
Weigh the convenience of "instant ambiance" with your security needs. Keep the following two aspects in mind:
(1) Any device connected to Internet is not wholly private. Ever.
(2) Unlocking your home before you have observed area for uninvited perpetrators may enable one to slip inside without your knowledge before you enter.
3
If it's on Wi-Fi, and thus the Internet, THEY will know what you do.
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Seems to me the truly 'Smart Home' is the one that doesn't have all this ephemera. Pretty sure you can figure out better ways to spend your hard-earned money and free time.
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Don’t do it. To understand what inviting AI into your home, read futurist Amy Webb’s The Big Nine. It will wake you up to what’s going on with AI and chill you. When “automate” your home, invite surveillance into your home via Alexa, you are making the mistake of you life.
Please read The Big Nine: How the Tech Titans and Their Thinking Machines Could Warp Humanity
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I work in tech research
The smart home is a million miles from being a reality
The makers of products are not consumer friendly
And there are no simple plug and play standards
As Apple showed, make it simple and demand will be there
23
A question ... my 20-year old smart home product had a great feature that I want to get ...
By entering my zip code, the program got my longitude & latitude so that I could turn on a light (like on the front porch) say, 15 minutes before sunset.
Can anyone recommend a product with this feature?
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@Rex Daley
I use the Lutron Caseta products with their Smart Bridge Pro2 controller to do this. Programming is done via a smartphone app.
My Wemo switch can be set for sunset turn on and sunrise turn off. Super simple to use via app and Alexa.
@Rex Daley Universal remote control Total Control line has products that do geofencing. Check out Integra Audio Video at www.integraaudiovideo.com and https://www.universalremote.com/total-control/overview/ for more information
On the other hand, read "There Will Come Soft Rains" by Ray Bradbury.
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My Honeywell Wi-Fi thermostat monitors my energy usage and sends me a monthly report - there is no way to opt out!
I don't know how to assess the privacy impacts of Amazon or Google home control products, but I am sure that my privacy does not matter to them.
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@John Adams
This is a big concern which may become a constitutional concern in the future.
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I am still waiting for a smart speaker that only uses a local network, with no connection to the Internet. I don't want any data collection by an outside entity. I have some Lutron dimmers and am planning on getting some Sonos speakers. It would be great to have voice control without any outsiders listening in to my house.
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@catlover
A French company called SNIPS is doing that
1
@catlover how will you get voice control without Siri, Google, or Amazon? The technology behind language comprehension and commands is complicated and expensive. I suspect you'll need to use one of these big 3 companies voice engines.
@catlover how will you get coffee control without Siri, Google, or Amazon? The technology behind language comprehension and commands is complicated and expensive. I suspect you'll need to use one of these big 3 companies voice engines.