Golden Oldies: Entrepreneurs: Tech vs. Responsibility And Accountability
by Miki Saxon
Poking through 13+ years of posts I find information that’s as useful now as when it was written.
Golden Oldies is a collection of the most relevant and timeless posts during that time.
This post and the quote from the FTC dates back to 2015. Nothing on the government side has changed; the Feds are still investigating and Congress is still talking. And as we saw in last weeks posts the company executives are more arrogant and their actions are much worse. One can only hope that the US government will follow in the footsteps of European countries and rein them in.
Read other Golden Oldies here.
Entrepreneurs are notorious for ignoring security — black hat hackers are a myth — until something bad happens, which, sooner or later, always does.
They go their merry way, tying all manner of things to the internet, even contraceptives and cars, and inventing search engines like Shodan to find them, with nary a thought or worry about hacking.
Concerns are pooh-poohed by the digerati and those voicing them are considered Luddites, anti-progress or worse.
Now Edith Ramirez, chairwoman of the Federal Trade Commission, voiced those concerns at CES, the biggest Internet of Things showcase.
“Any device that is connected to the Internet is at risk of being hijacked,” said Ms. Ramirez, who added that the large number of Internet-connected devices would “increase the number of access points” for hackers.
Interesting when you think about the millions of baby monitors, fitness trackers, glucose monitors, thermostats and dozens of other common items available and the hundreds being dreamed up daily by both startups and enterprise.
She also confronted tech’s (led by Google and Facebook) self-serving attitude towards collecting and keeping huge amounts of personal data that was (supposedly) the basis of future innovation.
“I question the notion that we must put sensitive consumer data at risk on the off chance a company might someday discover a valuable use for the information.”
At least someone in a responsible position has finally voiced these concerns — but whether or not she can do anything against tech’s growing political clout/money/lobbying power remains to be seen.
Image credit: centralasian
