How your personal details and data are things that many of us rarely, if ever, think about, but in the modern world, they are becoming an increasingly significant issue.
If you are one of the people that don’t care, that’s fine but a lot of people are growing more concerned about how their data is being used.
Just as many probably won’t even notice it as we’ve all become so accustomed to seeing screeds of text come up when we first sign up or log into something that we never bother to read, we just click okay to accept the terms. Without knowing what those terms are.
Few will give ti any thought, just get on with their lives and using whatever device or service they just signed up for never considering the consequences or impact it might have on them.
But buried in a lot of these T&Cs can be the ability for the company to share your data, sell it and so on.
Now, we’ll be clear here, we are not saying that every single appliance maker is selling or using your data beyond what they need for warranty registration and so on, not at all. What we’re saying is that some appear to be headed down that road, some may already be doing it, and these T&Cs can enable them to do so.
With more and more appliances being connected and supposedly “smart” this could become a problem.
You see, if all your use is effectively monitored then that data may become worth something to another company and we’ll give you a couple of examples.
Let’s say that you shop in Tesco (not picking on them at all and no idea if they do this, it’s a hypothetical) and Tesco knows, because you have a Clubcard and they know what you bought and when, they know you bought say Bold 1Kg box on X date.
They then get sold data from a washing machine brand that knows since X date you have done Y washes on whatever various cycles so they can pretty reasonably know when you will need more detergent.
All of a sudden, you start to see offers online and on your Tesco app telling you about detergents etc.
Other detergent companies might also buy that info so they can present you with competing offers so, someone gets to see the data twice… or more to different companies.
The beauty of it is, they get to you and shove this stuff in front of you right when you are thinking about getting some more detergent.
You might also get a “It’s time to buy detergent” message pop-up on your washing machine.
Worse, it may be the case that everyone can see how much you washed, what you washed in broad terms, the cycles you use and more.
Some people might think this is great, for some it might just be an annoyance but for many it could well be seen as an invasion of your privacy.
The thing is, you agreed to it all when you clicked to agree to the terms of use.
Later on, if you find you don’t like this, there’s nothing you can do about it other than to stop using the services or disconnect the appliance.
Cycle Count
Something like this has been around for a while with cycle counting.
One manufacturer who will remain nameless, will offer a ten year warranty or XXXXX cycles, kinda like the warranty on a car where it’s X years or XXX thousands of miles, you know the type of thing.
Which is fine and we’ve no truck with that, it’s a good thing in fact in our view and makers should be able to protect themselves in that way but, they shouldn’t hide it. That’s where we had a bit of an issue with this as that information could only be accessed by a laptop hooked up to the machine for diagnostics, it wasn’t consumer accessible.
So the customer called out service, thinking they were covered by warranty only to find they’d done too much washing and it was no longer covered. And, got a £100+ bill for their troubles.
That’s not good.
But it demonstrates that this information is there on some machines already and, if it’s connected it’d be almost no hassle for a maker o pull that info off.
Refrigeration
These are even more of a potential data goldmine as a lot of the food you buy and consume will pass through your fridge and/or freezer.
For years, makers have striven to find a way to see what’s in your fridge, with limited success, but if they ever crack it, imagine a global corporation being able to see what you’re eating, throwing out and so on.
And as with the washing machine example above, just imagine what supermarkets etc could do with all that info to try to sell you stuff, switch brands and so on.
Where’s all that data going? Who has access to it?
The short answer is you have no idea as it’d be likely sold to data brokers (yes, that’s a thing) and then resold to whoever has the cash to buy it.
Selling You On Smart
We suspect that this is part of the reason that makers have gone down this route, trying to sell people on “smart” appliances.
From what we’ve seen, most aren’t all that smart at all, really. They do pretty much the same thing in the same way that they did twenty years ago.
The “smart” and “AI” all appear to be little more than added-on bits and bobs that may or may not make some things better or provide a little more information to users but beyond that, it’s hard to see what there’s any fuss about.
The only advantage we can see is where you integrate your appliances and therefore energy use primarily into a wider smart home eco-system but for many that seems hard, if not impossible, to do.
Advertising, Programs/Installation
For those who don’t think that any of this will come to pass, it already has.
We’ve seen advertising now on Samsung fridge freezers in the USA and we’d hazard a guess that Samsung is earning revenue from those adverts.
If they get away with it do you really think others won’t follow and perhaps get more inventive?
Then there’s the dishwasher that, to install you need the manufacturer’s app to connect, create an account and commission as well as to enable programs.
These things are already here, now.
We’re better protected in the UK and EU but that’s not to say it can’t happen here.
Out point is, it is entirely possible that makers can glean a lot of information from your machines if they are connected and “smart” and advertising could be aimed at you that is constructed around that data. And, because nobody reads the T&Cs it’s very probable that few would ever even know they were being watched in this way.
If you don’t care, have at it, let anyone that want’s it to see what you’re up to. Fine by us.
For many though who will care, our advice would be to avoid connected machines if you can.