Tech Briefing Example

Here is an example of what you can post on the blog prior to presenting your tech briefing. We recently saw how vulnerable the Internet of Things is because they are developed with little security. Here is a short 11 minute interview with Avi Rubin on "What Happens when Hackers Hijack Our Smart Devices" (there is a video link there for a different Ted Talk - 16mins, but kinda scary examples). Given this vulnerabilty, it speaks to devices that do not have a lot of regulation (or security) in place. For example, police in Arkansas are trying to use Amazon's Echo data in a murder investigation. Based on court documents in November 2015, a man in Arkansas had some friends over at his house to watch a football game and in the morning, one of the friends was found dead in a hot tub in the backyard. Police later charged the man who lived in the house, James Bates, with murder. He has pleaded not guilty.

As the police were investigating the crime, they found a number of digital devices in the suspect's house, including an Amazon Echo device that was in the kitchen. They have since seized the device and have apparently gotten some information from it, but what they want to check is what — if anything — the device may have recorded around the time of the murder.

What kind of data are companies collecting about what goes on inside the home? What prevents these companies from giving up these data to law enforcement (including hackers or spies) any time they ask for (or take) it? Is anything being done to secure IoT?