The internet of things (IoT) refers to the nature of devices communicating and transmitting data between themselves. Its the shift in technology of seemingly dumb, previously isolated devices into merging with technology. Such technology ranges from sensors for weather, or bed side lamps that monitor your sleep (eg sleep phaser).
New devices have the capability of measuring the chemical intake of what you eat. While designed to alert doctors to problems and act as a preventative solution, its capabilities could be used within the marketing world to predict peoples eating habits and find correlations in areas seemingly unrelated areas through our habits.
Devices like Fridgecam connect previously offline devices to the internet, allowing them to communicate with your other devices servicing the end user. These types of devices use AI to identify what is visible to the camera within your home. This raises privacy concerns as these companies have access to audio and video recordings, often outsourcing the analysis and deep learning of this data to smaller companies. These companies have been known to leak this data, similar to Microsofts leaks, and apple. These products pose the risk of being hacked leaking personal information to the public.
There have been reports that the CIA developed a hack for smart TVs allowing them to record audio, and video within your living rooms. Taking a newly developed tool and using it to spy on its users. Adding to the complexity most users or manufacturers don’t understand how to create and manage networks, the importance of encryption, or how to create and store a safe password when managing IoT devices.
Smart devices and the IoT are able to collect from a wide source of big data allowing them to predict actions and desires before they physically manifest. Also known as the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, users paying attention to something are likely to see it more often. For this reason manufactures of Smart speakers and displays have taken precaution to design the device in such a way that its recording instruments can be physically disabled.
These IoT devices are evolving to be able to identify our needs, and deliver them to us as we need them. Common tools consumers may use to fill in some of the compatibility gaps include IFTTT, which takes commands from one device and forwards it to another. This could be as simple as opening the garage door when a sensor is tripped, or automatically texting you are safe when you get home.
These devices are growing in numbers, affordability, and capability making more of the tasks we do smart. Collecting more and more data of how we behave and interact within the digital and real world. In doing so our collection of big data makes marketing easier by identifying processes in the decision making process, allowing us to market products right when you need it. Beacon technology allows us to track users location (eg leaving or entering a store), map consumer paths for in shop displays and design, frequency of visits, tailed messaging, guiding people, gamification, cross-selling, and loyalty (eg Google Pay will remind you to use Woolworth rewards). This type of technology combined with IoT devices opens up a world of possibilities that will seem strangely magical to what we have today.
Do you believe your phone, tv, or alarm clock is listening, and if so do you trust the company behind it to manage your data?
Do you have any smart of IoT devices in your home, if so have they impacted your purchasing behaviour?
RMIT Assignment 3 
Hi James, I think there definitely exist trust issue with big corporations in managing users data. It is not a conspiracy that corporation are listening to us. I think the right question to ask now is are we aware of what we are speaking to them. Are all we consciously giving this information or are we not?. On whether or not Smart Tv and other smart device have changed my purchasing behaviour, the answer is yes. However, there is a catch. It is not any better than what my internet browser does. As we grow to be more and more familiar with tactics and strategy that business use. We have builds resistant to them. Nonetheless, as a marketer, the question still remained is how can we use this information in an ethical way.
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I absolutely believe that my phone is listening to me, it goes without saying that sometimes I’ll see ads appear on social media for products that I mentioned verbally when speaking to friends, but never typed or searched on my phone itself. And I think most people can recount such an experience too, so it’s a pretty unanimous concept in our lives nowadays. Is it a bad thing? Possibly, because it can be perceived as creepy. But on the brighter side, hey, at least I’m getting ads for content I’m actually interested in. Mostly, it’s creepy, though, I’ll still accept that’s just how things are now. I suppose you could argue that our ancestors never needed all these smart devices, and they got along perfectly fine and lived perfectly happy lives.
So why do we need them so badly today? I guess with the evolution of technology, the growth of markets and increase in the number of competitors, companies need a way to really identify your needs and find the best products to fulfil those needs, hence all the listening and data collection. There are pros and cons for both sides, to be honest, but with the way things are going all we can do is adapt and be open to innovation and technological change.
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i believe that my phone and laptop is listening, their isn’t much you can actually do since i need to use my phone and laptop daily. I don’t trust the companies but there isn’t much you can do about it since it is most companies that do it.
You-tube tends to do that to me a lot since it shows me stuff that i might be interested to watch. As far as i know nothing else is used against me.
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The Economist did a really interest special report on this topic a short while ago: https://www.economist.com/technology-quarterly/2019/09/12/the-internet-of-things-will-bring-the-internets-business-model-into-the-rest-of-the-world. It really seems that almost all of these innovations are small, boring changes that collectively make a huge difference and have the potential for a revolution in productivity. But you are right to focus on privacy concerns, which some can donwplay in their excitement of this new technology.
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Just today Google announced another innovation on their smart speakers IOT devices. Combining small features from stand alone devices together they put their Google assistant smart speakers into mesh wireless access points. I am happy they have made these additions, but I’m also unsure about the privacy side of having Google overview both your home internet activity, and voice commands in one device. How much data do they have access to from these devices?
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Amazing article James, as consumers are vividly becoming more aware of privacy concerns and how their data is managed you find companies are pushing harder to win consumer interest in the area of privacy. In apples keynotes and marketing campaigns they push the notion of how secure their systems are, and how apple as a company does not have access to your data. Similar with google as seen even as recently as their keynote this morning, where they pushed a new stance of the privacy front and their commitment to protecting the interests of their vast user base. However we see this privacy front far too much with companies to little avail, as wave after wave of privacy leaks, and companies going behind users backs in secret deals or large scale hacks are kept silent for months or years. This tarnishes only that message and leaves users trust hurt in the interest of keeping shareholders happy. In the modern age will the continuation of advancement and new practices like AI and blockchain be proof that humanity greatest mistake may well be it’s inability to protect itself from venturing too rapidly into an connected and digitalised world without ensuring proper safety concerns are met.
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