Voyeur's delight

Microsoft is off to a poor start on privacy matters with their Xbox One console.  I was surprised to hear that you must maintain a constant connection to the internet whilst playing games.  You must also be connected to Kinect - the 3D camera and microphone with the console.

Potentially you could be spied on and listened to then pay for the privilege since it's your connection that is being used to send any information back up the line.

Just putting aside whether Microsoft may want to spy on you, what about anyone else that gains access to your connection or hacks into the Xbox servers?

Coming in the same week that we hear that the NSA's Prism programme has direct access to trawl through our private data held at some of the world's biggest providers, anyone with anything to hide probably shouldn't be hooking one of these consoles up. 

There's probably going to be a lot of discussion on this one so watch the web for stories.  In the meantime when you get your shiny new console, probably best not to play games in your underpants or worse and only say nice things about Redmond. You never know who's looking in.

Xbox One has spying eye (Stuff)

Covert contact

Here's a shining example of multiple cutting edge technologies converging to create what could be the next
generation of high tech eye wear.

Forget Google Glass - how about all seeing contact lenses?

We all know that an inherent weakness of the current generation screens on our smartphones and tablets is that they are fragile, inflexible and prone to damage.

The fragility comes primarily from needing to use inflexible glass and plastic to protect the conductive indium tin oxide layer.

South Korean scientists have substituted a flexible, transparent layer of atom-thick graphene to replace the indium and have embedded nanowires to carry the electric pulses within a soft contact lens.

An LED screen within a contact lens

This design provides the potential to take photographs, video and to receive interactive feeds onto an inorganic LED screen embedded within the lens.

If people are worried about the privacy invasion possible from the much more obvious Google Glass then they should be positively terrified of the opportunities for covert surveillance and privacy abuse if this technology is introduced.

The tracking aspects of this technology work both ways.  The software constantly tracks the wearer - this sounds a lot like that wonderful but ominous show, Person of Interest.  You are being watched !

You are being watched

On the positive side, such a device could be incredibly useful, replacing the need for a user to carry a separate screen in their hand.

Such advances would not be possible if it wasn't for the highly innovative approach that scientists and manufacturers are taking to marrying up the advantages of so many cutting edge technologies.

Reflection 

Although just a few years ago this device would have been confined to the realm of  science fiction, it's now a reality.  This is a shining example of how fast development is moving in different but connected fields.  We are seeing so many strands converging to make possible a whole new technology.  Consider what has gone into this device:

• Nanotechnology has given us the abillity to create electronic circuits so tiny they can easily fit into a small part of contact lens
• Radical new materials such as graphene are being harnessed to provide amazing capabilities - graphene is the strongest material we have on our planet, it's incredibly flexible, it's totally transparent, it weighs next to nothing yet it can be equipped with an intricate network of electrodes to provide the conductive layer of this device
• Advances in screen displays have given us a tiny inorganic LED screen that fits within the lens
• Wireless communications and the availability of a world wide internet infrastructure means that such technology can be deployed across the globe
• The power of this technology is that we can connect this tiny camera/transmitter/receiver to computers and enormous power - there really is no limit to what we could do with the technology.

Most of all though, beyond the technological abilities demonstrated here, there is the human desire to innovate, to create such capability and to use it.  That is truly inspiring.

More on tracking technology

Blink of an eye (NZ Herald)

Transparent flexible electrodes demonstrated by Korean researchers (Asia Research News)

More bans for Google Glass functionality (Guardian UK) 

Going through the motions

Leap Motion lets you drive your computer with finger gestures

There's a lot of focus on technology that makes access to computers more intuitive.  We're not expected to rely solely on a keyboard or a mouse now to make our devices respond to our commands.

Touchscreens made the keyboard redundant on tablets and smartphones.  Now gesture controlled operation is set to add more capability to the computer interface.

Using sensors to detect movement is nothing new.  We've been relying on this technology for many years in our motion detector alarm systems , in lighting systems that activate when you enter the room and in those floodlights you have to light up a dark path.  These systems are all fairly crude in that they are detecting heat and motion changes then triggering a single response - light a bulb or sound an alarm.

The new motion sensors for our computers are a bit smarter than that.  They are detecting intricate patterns of movement through Sudden Motion Sensor technology and using this to trigger one of many outcomes. Take a look at this technology from Hewlett-Packard in conjunction with San Francisco start-up, Leap Motion.  The sensors apparently detect movement  across all of your fingers with amazing precision.  HP has such confidence in Leap Motion that they will be initially shipping the sensor units packaged with some of their devices and then integrating them into new models.

Science fiction becomes science future (image from Minority Report)

What they need now is for the community to get behind this and for designers to build applications that deploy the Leap Motion technology.  The're off to a great start with some 50,000 developers already requesting toolkits.

How long will it be before we can drive our computers like Tom Cruise did so effectively in Minority Report?  With innovations like this, maybe not too long at all.  

Leap Motion logo

HP and Leap Motion innovation for gesture control (Stuff)

HP hopes gesture control will revitalise the PC market (Bloomberg)

Leap Motion-enabled devices shipping with Airspace (eWeek)

The Sudden Motion Sensor

Orwellian outlook

"You are being watched every hour of every day"

You are being watched !

Imagine a society where everyone was tagged and all of your movements were recorded.  This has echoes of an Orwellian world of totalitarian governments where papers were required to be carried at all times and could be inspected many times a day.  With modern technology like RFID, NFC, or GPS monitoring that tracking would not just be occasional but instead it could be active 24/7.

Popular culture has embraced the concept of tracking with many science fiction (or maybe science forecast) movies, like Gattaca, Logan's Run, Minority Report.  The TV series Person of Interest highlights the huge usage of cameras that use facial recognition techniques and record this information in vast state-controlled databases.  Analysis of this huge data store is somehow use to predict crime before it happens.

Consider how new passports are issued with biometric information encoded on a chip, how visitors to US, even if they are only passing through as transit passengers, are herded through Immigration. The US government is building a huge database on non-US nationals and potentially has more information about these individuals than their only sovereign governments.  What does the US intend to use this data mine for?  Will they be passing this on to other state authorities or commercial organisations?

The answers to these questions are not something that we will readily find in the public domain.  Many commentators will provide an opinion.

Like any tracking technology there are some really positive benefits.  Unfortunately the shadow of big brother means that we all need to be aware that for all the advantages of modern tracking technology there are some real dangers to our privacy and personal freedom.

Sometimes being connected may not always be in your best interests.

Some tracking news stories

Police use GPS to track (Cnet)

Surveillance cameras

Tag and track in american schools

RFID for toll road tracking

RFID tracking blog (Techdirt)

CCTV in UK cities (Business Insider)

Chicago is most watched US city (CBS News)

CCTV surveillance in New Zealand (Waikato Times)

Person of Interest Fan Blog

For fans of the TV show Person of Interest

Chipped

Tracked and dangerous

Does your office door magically open when you wave a plastic card close to a scanner?

NFC equipped Snapper Card

Do you pay for your morning bus ride by holding a Snapper card (Oyster in London, Octopus in Hong Kong) in front of a GPS-enabled reader whilst waiting for it to debit your card for the fare?

Well, if you answered yes, the chances are you are using a contactless card, probably featuring a Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) chip and possibly Near Field Communication (NFC) technology.

Hong Kong's Octopus Card is like Snapper

The chip in the card requires no separate power source and uses just the radio waves emitted from the reader/writer.  All very clever and generally reliable.

RFID has become so common place in proximity cards that most people don't even stop to think what is happening every time you wave the card.  RFID provides a unique code that identifies the user individually.  This means that each card can be tailored to the user's specific requirement so if you don't need to be given access to a specific area, well that's easily sorted.

NFC technology in a payment card

You may also have already experienced the next generation of point of sale (POS) devices that use Near Field Communication (NFC) to automatically debit your bank account when you wave a card, like a Visa payWave, a MasterCard PayPass or even an NFC-chipped smartphone in front of a special reader.  Just 'Tap and Go'.

Animal magic

RFID controlled cat flap

RFID technology is widely used for livestock tracking. A valuable animal like a cow or sheep will probably be 'chipped' by the farmer and recorded as a stock item in the farm's database.  That unique code can then be used to track every treatment received by the animal, monitor weight gain, record sale of the animal or provide evidence of ownership for insurance purposes. Not only livestock have benefited from RFID.  Many pet-owners will 'microchip' their wee ones by having the vet insert an RFID under the skin.  These tags can then be read at animal shelters, or council inspectors for tracking down the owners of lost pets.  You may even invest in a pet door that reads the RFID to allow or prevent entry (I want one of these).

This all seems really useful - sounds like a great idea that should be encouraged, doesn't it?

Hey, we could even use it to track people.  Hmm, now I'm not so sure I like the sound of this.  Well, why not - we already track felons released into the community via ankle bracelets linked to GPS.

Check out this post for a discussion on the darker side of tracking.

Understanding the difference - NFC and RFID

Some tracking news stories

Ear tag (Wikipedia)

AniTrace UHF RFID products (Manufacturer site)

Auckland Snapper thrown back

Snapper in a smartphone

OysterCard FAQ

Contactless card technology (EFTPOS NZ)

Quick response unit

A QR (Quick Response) code

Do you know what a QR (Quick Response) code is?

'Err, not sure' is a likely answer from many people here in New Zealand  Ask a Korean or a Japanese visitor and the response is more likely to be 'are you kidding? Everyone knows about QR'.

Market penetration is patchy here in Godzone.  Now, if you were to show someone a QR code the response may well be 'Oh, that thing.  Yes, I've seen them but I don't know what they're for.'  Such is the poor take-up that this technology has had.  With other technologies coming along that do the same and much more besides,QR will need to get cracking if it's going to be a big hit here in NZ.

I think we can look at QR as an improvement on the bar code.  The pattern can store up to 7000 characters, so it's excellent for holding web links and comments, slogans, buzzwords, etc.  If you print a QR code on a poster or a tag, an educated smartphone user can scan it (using a special app) and be either transported to the supplied web link or have the secret message displayed on the screen.

Cracking the QR Code (Stuff article)

Clearly there are some barriers to adoption here in our market::

• Many people don't know what QR is
• Even if you know what QR can do, you may be less than excited about it
• Technologies like near field communication (NFC) are just around the corner and they will do the QR transportation gig, plus a lot more besides
• You need a scanner to participate in QR - that usually means a smartphone
• Some smartphones, especially older ones don't recognise QR consistently
• You need to install and open a special scanner app before you can read a QR code - that is way too much hassle for some people
• They've gained something a bad reputation for exploitation by bad people, who have been known to embed web links for some dodgy destinations.  Click one of these and you are likely to be put off the technology for life

Educating the public about QR

I understand that these codes were originally invented as a successor to the ubiquitous bar code and that make a lot of sense.  As well as providing a bar code ID these could hold all sorts of detailed information about the product, model, characteristics, etc.  A definite improvement, for sure.

What are there chances for widespread adoption here in NZ?  Well, based on the lukewarm responses and generally poor understanding, I've seen to date, I wouldn't give you great odds if I was a betting man.

Other technologies like QR

IKEA has augmented reality catalogue

One company that is exploiting this kind of technology without actually using QR is IKEA.  Their 2013 print catalogue contains  icons that, when scanned by your smartphone (running the IKEA app), will transport you online to view bonus videos, additional product information and promotional opportunities.

IKEA catalogue with augmented reality

Catalogue article and video (Gizmodo)

Fairfax added value technology

Fairfax media in Australia and New Zealand has been providing readers with a similar 'added value' experience in their newspaper print editions.  Scanning a photograph that bears the branded icon will take a smartphone user to additional online information about the topic.

Get smart (Fairfax)

Some local interest in QR

Major New Zealand player, The Warehouse,  is having a go at using QR.  Take a look at this advertisement, sent out recently to online subscribers . .  .

Red Alert is a series of online daily deals offered by the Warehouse in New Zealand

QR is a boon for real estate listings

Maybe I've been a bit unkind in saying that QR hasn't taken off in New Zealand.  I guess since I wrote this post I've become more attuned to spotting them.  Here's an excellent use for the technology - real estate agents are publishing QR codes alongside property listings.  A quick scan of the code with your smartphone and you can be transported to the agent's site for more detailed listing information, comparable properties and direct access to an  open2view portfolio that the vendor may be using.  A great example of QR in action.

Convergence on wheels

Asteroid in-car entertainment and navigation

Another shining example of how multiple technologies are converging into a single highly desirable consumer product.  This time it's the Android-powered Asteroid - basically a hybrid GPS, entertainment system accessed via a tablet type interface.

The Parrot Asteroid brings web streaming services like Spotify direct from your car dashboard.

Imagine if such a device had appeared a few years ago.  What would we have made of it?  I think the reason that we accept these multi-function devices so readily today is that we are already acquainted with what purpose each application serves, since we've seen them before in dedicated, standalone devices.  Armed with the prior knowledge we can accept this innovative forward step without too much hesitation.

The 2011 incarnation was less exciting

That's an important factor in understanding why such technology can march on into the welcoming grasp of tech-hungry consumers.  Once we would have been suspicious when confronted with new technology but now we happily embrace it.  I guess it helps that the market price is generally reasonable but it's really our eagerness to have our portable always on, net-connected gadgets that makes this kind of accelerated adoption a reality.

See the review for more information . . .

Asteroid (NZ Herald)

Parrot Asteroid article (South Africa)

Oh the humble bar code

Bar Code

An historical technology that’s still enormously useful today is the bar code.

We see them everywhere – on every product we buy from the supermarket, retail store.

They are used the world over for inventory control.  They identify the product model, the manufacturer.  They can uniquely identify millions of products, wherever in the world they are used.

Given that they use a pretty lo-fi monochrome series of vertical bars they can be printed on a huge number of materials, they are incredibly precise.  Built-in error prevention exists in the form of a check digit line that uses an algorithm to ensure the code has been scanned accurately.

Although we seldom give them much thought they are one of those base technologies that our modern world needs.  Without the ability to rapidly scan large numbers of products we couldn’t have supermarkets or retail warehouses of the convenience we expect.  Throughput of product counting, selling, warehousing would be drastically reduced. 

QR Code

Barcodes took retail sales out of the corner shop era.  They mean that shops no longer need to price each article, the price can be adjusted immediately without any re-pricing of the individual items.

The vast depots of Amazon and Walmart could never be accessed without barcodes and derivatives.  Supermarkets couldn’t draw on the in-depth sales analysis that tells them precisely who bought what and how much.

It’s a technology that will be with us for many years to come.  It’s given rise to other optical marks such as the QR codes that can hold so much more information, such as web URLs.

Humble but such a vital part of modern commerce.