The Swedish Data Inspection Board. Ubiquitous Computing
The Swedish Data Inspection Board
If you say “Ubicomp”, many laughs and thinks of intelligent fridge. But the phenomenon should not be underestimated. For years, IT industry in the U.S., EU and Japan spent astronomical sums on development. People and equipment are bound together in a giant wireless network, it is intended, and it could mean the biggest threat to privacy. The Data Inspection Board has produced a report on the phenomenon.
Ubicomp, or Ubiquitous Computing, ie computing power which in a natural way is omnipresent without thinking about it – much like electricity is today – is regarded by IT industry as a future cash cow: a readily available, wireless infrastructure for information and communication to able to:
• Identify and locate people and equipment. Wireless. Everywhere. In real time.
• Obtain and provide information between people and from sensors that look belongs, measuring and control devices.
• Learn the users’ personal preferences, device performance, etc..
Ubicomp vision came almost twenty years ago, but the system requires three basic functions that only now can discern the solution to:
• Wireless identification. Here, RFID matured and become cheap.
• Wireless broadband. 4G needed to meet the requirements Ubicomp picture – it’s going on.
• An almost infinite number of Internet addresses. The next generation Internet Protocol, IPv6, is under development. It should be enough to “address every grain of sand on the earth.”
There is talk of Ubicomp will revolutionize the workplace, health care, transportation, trade and home, but they attempt to concretize the vision that we have seen so far has been a slight jerk stamp, such as smart fridge that tells when the milk is running low. But one should not underestimate the driving forces behind the development, the world’s IT industry represents a huge economic power, we need new business and is now focusing on Ubicomp.
If Ubicomp will, it may mean the biggest threat to privacy. It is difficult to keep a store for a threat that you do not know what it will look like, but this year is Ubicomp top of the program for data protection managers’ annual world conference in Montreal in september. And the Data Inspection Board has commissioned a report, “Ubiquitous Computing – a vision can become a reality.”
http://www.datainspektionen.se/press/nyheter/2007/Skratta-inte-at-Ubicomp/