"The Internet of Broken Things"

Brad R Friday 08 April 2016 - 17:56:02  

I salute Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols for the phrase "The Internet of Broken Things," in his article about the Google/Nest/Revolv fiasco. He sums up the situation neatly:

When Google’s Nest acquired Revolv in 2014, it was buying what was thought of as the Rosetta Stone of the Internet of Things (IoT). Revolv enabled users and vendors to connect their gear together regardless of their connection protocols, from Bluetooth and Wi-Fi to ZigBee and Z-Wav.

Consumers who had bought Revolv’s $300 device might have felt a bit queasy when the first thing that Nest did with Revolv was to discontinue the product. Things would only get worse. Now they have.

This month, Nest announced that the remaining Revolv connected-home hubs will not be supported beyond mid-May. “We can’t allocate resources to Revolv anymore and we have to shut down the service,” the company’s founders said on the Revolv website. “As of May 15, 2016, your Revolv hub and app will no longer work.”

It's not merely that Nest will no longer offer updates or customer support for the Revolv. They are deliberately "bricking" working hardware out in the field, even though those devices were sold with a "lifetime subscription." In college we used to joke that a "lifetime guarantee" meant "guaranteed for the life of the product" -- when the product breaks, its lifetime is over. Now Nest is offering that in all seriousness -- they say the product's lifetime is officially ended, so they don't need to provide any more support.

This is like Amazon deleting books without warning from customers' Kindles. Or Microsoft disabling your PC without warning.

The common factor -- and the Goodbye, Microsoft connection -- is that these are all software traps. The hardware is still perfectly good, but the manufacturer has decided to disable the software. And because you don't own the software -- you merely have a license to use it -- you have little or no legal recourse. You signed up for that shrink-wrap agreement, and now you're screwed.

This has ever been the problem with closed-source, proprietary software. There are countless websites devoted to providing support for commercial packages whose creators have gone out of business, or merely decided they "can't allocate resources" to their old products. The problem is made worse by intellectual-property laws that forbid reverse-engineering, forbid adopting "orphanware," and forbid trying to circumvent a manufacturer who is determined to brick the hardware you thought you owned.

And of course, with the "Internet of Things," this will only get worse. The expected lifetime of a refrigerator is 17 years. Can you name one software maker anywhere who is still supporting 17-year-old products? Or will your Internet-enabled refrigerator be remotely switched off after three years, like the Revolv?

The first tip for how to avoid this comes from the Electronic Frontier Foundation:

...there's another way to push back against untrustworthy devices, and that's refusing to buy electronics and software that prioritize the manufacturer's wishes above your own. Certainly Alphabet, which owns both Nest and Google, is going to have trouble selling its hardware in the future if it doesn't provide customers some assurance that they won't be left in the cold like those who rely on the Revolv Hub.

Second, look for devices that have -- or can have -- open-source firmware. We use a venerable WRT54G router, which can be reloaded with open-source firmware like DD-WRT. Even with the standard firmware, I don't believe the WRT54G can be remotely "bricked" by Linksys.

Third, resist the temptation for gee-whiz devices. Do you really need a refrigerator that can talk to the Internet? Do you really need a "smart" thermostat that can fail due to a software bug and leave you freezing, with no way to fix it? Prefer simple, autonomous devices over complex, networked gadgets.

The "Internet of Things" always sounded to me like a solution in search of a problem. Now it sounds like a problem waiting to happen. Take care of yourself, and protect your computing freedom...even down to the level of thermostats and light switches.

More reading about the Revolv:

The CBC: Nest's move to stop supporting Revolv smart hub leaves customers with costly 'brick'
USA Today: Glenn Reynolds: Do we even own things anymore?
Yahoo News: As Google shuts down Revolv, anxiety about the Internet of Things gears up
CIO: Google's Nest struggles could set back the IoT movement
Business Insider: Google's Nest might pay customers as compensation for shutting down their $300 smart-home devices (If Google is smart, they will; but lately Google has been more arrogant than smart.)
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