Our discussion last Tuesday lead by Mack Talcott and Blake Thomson revolved around the topics of the Mozilla Geode to Join Google and the Yahoo for Geolocation Web Services. As an add on for Firefox, Geode takes advantage of the Skyhook Wireless' Loki technology that map the Wi-Fi signals in your area to your location. During our discussion of Geode we marked the positives of being able to find local locations fast, easy and automatic. Which lead to the negatives of privacy and security. We also learned about the Yahoo's FireEagle services which lead to a surprise presentation of Whirl.
Geode and FireEagle were interesting products which brought up much debate between the class. Exact locations being sent back to Mozilla or Yahoo to be stored in databases with confident levels made some question the integrity of the companies and the implied trust we have for big companies. Right now there are security checks where we are prompted by the products for how much personal information, like exact location, we would like to give up. What if it comes to the point where products like Geode can get your information without that notification? Questions like those came up often in our discussion. However there were also arguments supporting these technologies. Ideas such as personal banking and select locations just to name one was brought up only to be challenged by the idea of a stranger with a laptop coming to the front of your house and hack into your bank account.
Like the previous week we as a class discussed the legal ramifications of these technologies. How would it be regulated and how can we keep it secure? At one point it was brought up that the law makers who make these laws sometimes don't even know the technology itself. How can a product that is legalized by someone who is not familiar with it be possibly fool proof?
As we moved on we were given a surprise presentation of a start up companies called Whirl. It was a very interesting online social environment that was similar to Geode and FireEagle in that it logs your location and gives notifications of friends who are near. Again the familiar question of security came up, how does the program share its information? Also who is going to see it? We ended our day's discussion to with facebook and myspace. We came to the conclusion that people should generally be more careful when using such social online services. Somethings like pictures that other people post of you can later come back and hurt you.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Nike & iPod Security
An important announcement:
*if you want to put a picture up on the blog, make sure you have the picture's owner's permission
The Nike & iPod Security problem is old news--about 2 years old. However, it's not clear whether the security problems were ever addressed. Basically, the sensor broadcasts your information for a radius of ~60 feet.
Everyone agreed that it is best for people to expose this kind of problem before it can be exploited. That way consumers know what they're getting into, and companies can fix problems quickly.
Some new passports, drivers licenses, and credit cards have embedded RFID. This would allow private data to be visible to the government, and some large corporations... Or whoever else might have the technology to intercept the data. On the other hand, using them in nursing homes could save lives; tracking criminals on parole would help keep the public safe; parents could track their children, and make sure they got to school and home safely. But where do you draw the line between safety and invasion of privacy.
There was some debate of the role of the researchers, and the role of the companies, and in the end, the idea of having separate ethics team (for problems about is this an acceptable flaw to ship with); a hacker team (to discover the problems in the first place).
So, at the end of the day, the companies should do their best to create good products, but it is the consumers who decide whether the flaws outweigh the benefits. But the consumers must have access to information about their information is/could be used.
*if you want to put a picture up on the blog, make sure you have the picture's owner's permission
The Nike & iPod Security problem is old news--about 2 years old. However, it's not clear whether the security problems were ever addressed. Basically, the sensor broadcasts your information for a radius of ~60 feet.
Everyone agreed that it is best for people to expose this kind of problem before it can be exploited. That way consumers know what they're getting into, and companies can fix problems quickly.
Some new passports, drivers licenses, and credit cards have embedded RFID. This would allow private data to be visible to the government, and some large corporations... Or whoever else might have the technology to intercept the data. On the other hand, using them in nursing homes could save lives; tracking criminals on parole would help keep the public safe; parents could track their children, and make sure they got to school and home safely. But where do you draw the line between safety and invasion of privacy.
There was some debate of the role of the researchers, and the role of the companies, and in the end, the idea of having separate ethics team (for problems about is this an acceptable flaw to ship with); a hacker team (to discover the problems in the first place).
So, at the end of the day, the companies should do their best to create good products, but it is the consumers who decide whether the flaws outweigh the benefits. But the consumers must have access to information about their information is/could be used.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Neurobotics
For our first discussion, we talked about neurobotics, which is an exciting new research area that combines neuroscience with robotics. In particular, we discussed the research of University of Washington Professor Yoky Matsuoka. In her research, Prof. Matsuoka and her team are building an anatomically correct testbed (ACT) robotic hand. One of their goals is to create prosthetic hands that move just like human hands and can be controlled directly by neural signals. For this, they not only build robots but they also study neuro-musculo-skeletal functions. In their lab, the team also investigates other related problems including improving the safety of life-size haptic environments, using robots and feedback distortion for rehabilitation, and building a hand exoskeleton.
Neurobotics clearly has the impact of transforming the life of handicapped people. Not only will they be able to recover the use of lost limbs, they will also be able to better fit-in by having prosthetics that look just like real limbs. These devices could also enable faster rehabilitation to patients not only through feedback distortion but also through adequate exoskeleton-type support.
An interesting problem that we discussed is that of sensory feedback. These prosthetics will be controlled by neural signals but should they produce feedback signals? What if a person accidentally cuts off a finger from their robotic hand, should they feel the corresponding pain? Perhaps a good option is for the arm to provide sensory feedback so a person knows that their prosthetic is being damaged but that signal should be attenuated or in a different form so as not to cause too much pain.
Another important problem that we addressed relates to the moral implications of healthy people voluntarily replacing their limbs with artificial ones. Will this ever be a problem? Should we prevent such a practices by limiting the capabilities of these replacement parts? Is this possible since there are always people willing to do anything for money?
Our discussion also covered additional topics including adding extra limbs (wouldn't it be cool to have an extra set of arms and be able to eat and drink while driving?), security (what if someone interferes with the functioning of an artificial limb?), and several others.
Neurobotics clearly has the impact of transforming the life of handicapped people. Not only will they be able to recover the use of lost limbs, they will also be able to better fit-in by having prosthetics that look just like real limbs. These devices could also enable faster rehabilitation to patients not only through feedback distortion but also through adequate exoskeleton-type support.
An interesting problem that we discussed is that of sensory feedback. These prosthetics will be controlled by neural signals but should they produce feedback signals? What if a person accidentally cuts off a finger from their robotic hand, should they feel the corresponding pain? Perhaps a good option is for the arm to provide sensory feedback so a person knows that their prosthetic is being damaged but that signal should be attenuated or in a different form so as not to cause too much pain.
Another important problem that we addressed relates to the moral implications of healthy people voluntarily replacing their limbs with artificial ones. Will this ever be a problem? Should we prevent such a practices by limiting the capabilities of these replacement parts? Is this possible since there are always people willing to do anything for money?
Our discussion also covered additional topics including adding extra limbs (wouldn't it be cool to have an extra set of arms and be able to eat and drink while driving?), security (what if someone interferes with the functioning of an artificial limb?), and several others.
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