The Guardian 2014-01-10. - Två intressanta artiklar från Guardian om en ny Orwellsk trygghetsprodukt för konsumentmarknaden, som det tagit forskarna 10 år att utveckla till perfektion...
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- Massproduktionen börjar snart av ett armband som via GPS ger föräldrar möjlighet att totalövervaka sina barn dygnet om. Priset förväntas ligga runt 2000 kronor för produkten. Liknande enklare produkter har under ett antal år använts till bl.a. olydiga husdjur eller fast egendom som ibland "kan få fötter..."
Produkten som snart lanseras fungerar även på t.ex. gamla och bara fantasin sätter gränser för övriga användningsområden för det nya armbandet som kan förändra världen...
Produkten som snart lanseras fungerar även på t.ex. gamla och bara fantasin sätter gränser för övriga användningsområden för det nya armbandet som kan förändra världen...
- Om folk nu vill ha den typen av 1984-värld..?
("- Oooh, what was I thinking?" Klart att de vill, ...men jag va i a f tvungen att fråga..:) Övrig text på engelska från Guardian. - reds.anm.)
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The ability to track the location - and perhaps behaviour - of children - has become a reality thanks to a team from Manchester and what they claim is a "first of its kind" GPS tracker and mobile phone wristband.
Hidden in the depths of the auxiliary halls at the CES gadget show in Las Vegas is a small British company usually based in Manchester’s MediaCityUK, showing off a prototype its pioneering wearable safety device for children and the elderly.
Working in conjunction with Manchester University, KMS say its wristband is essentially a very simple small, wrist-worn mobile phone with integrated GPS that has just one button.
Panic button
It works like a panic button that when pressed dials a series of pre-programmed phone numbers until it gets an answer from a human, automatically detecting answer machines and skipping to the next number in the list.
“Simplicity was the key for our target audience of children and vulnerable adults. It had to be easy enough for anyone to use, even for those people who would not be able to operate a standard mobile phone,” said Chris Etchells, co-founder of KMS talking to the Guardian at CES.
The Wristband is charged wirelessly and the battery lasts around two days of use, but will notify the manager of the device when it hits 20% battery by email, and then call the designated number at 10% battery.
KMS also made the wristband automatically answer incoming calls, allowing parents, relatives and friends to call to check up on the child even if they wouldn’t necessarily answer a ringing phone from their parents.
Geo-fencing and tracking
Coupled to the mobile phone is an assisted GPS chip, which allows parents or carers to track the wearer on a map using a website or smartphone app.
KMS has also developed a geographic ring-fencing feature, which automatically tracks the child wearing the wristband and notifies its parents when it leaves a pre-defined safe zone or route of travel, allowing them to call the band.
On top of the band is a Vcode 2D barcode which encodes information about the person wearing the band including their blood type, their allergies and an emergency contact number, should the child or wearer get lost or involved in an incident.
“It took eight months to develop, but I’ve been working on the idea behind it for the best part of 10 years,” said Etchells talking about how he came up with the concept while working with vulnerable adults.
Etchells explains that in the testing of the device, rather than feeling like they were being watched, the child testers saw it as a gateway to allowing them to play outside without supervision, as the parents felt more comfortable letting the kids play knowing they could keep an eye on them remotely and track them if they wandered off.
- The wristband is in its final stage of development, and is expected to be ready for production and will then go on sale for about £200 in September 2014.
For those who think the NSA the worst invader of privacy, I invite you to share an afternoon with Aiden and Foster, two 11-year-old boys, as they wrap up a Friday at school. Aiden invites his friend home to hang out and they text their parents, who agree to the plan.
As they ride on the bus Foster's phone and a sensor on a wristband alert the school and his parents of a deviation from his normal route. The school has been notified that he is heading to Aiden's house so the police are not called.
As they enter the house, the integrated home network recognises Aiden and pings an advisory to his parents, both out at work, who receive the messages on phones and tablets.
The system also sends Foster's data – physical description, address, relatives, health indicators, social media profile - to Aiden's parents, who note he has a laptop. Might the boys visit unsuitable sites? No, because Foster's parental rating access, according to his profile, is limited to PG13, as is Aiden's.
- Foster spots a cookie jar and reaches in. Beep beep! His wristband vibrates to warn him the cookies contain gluten, and he is allergic.
Aiden's mother notes this and consults a menu of her fridge and pantry, all connected to the network, for non-gluten ingredients. There aren't enough so she orders a gluten-free pizza.
The boys turn on the TV. Rather, it turns itself on as Aiden approaches and it lists his favourite channels. The TV notes the boys have a basketball, which has a sensor, and so suggests an NBA game. As they watch, tailored advertising invites Aiden to put a Miami Heat shirt on a personal wishlist connected to a chain store.
He does so and a ping is sent to his mother, who simultaneously receives a reminder of the date of his birthday.
The network notes there is only 90 minutes left of sunlight left and that Aiden has not completed his 120 minutes of daily exercise. It shuts down the TV and gives the boys three exercise options. They choose to shoot hoops in the yard. Aiden's mum receives an alert that they have left the house – leaving the lights on. She can track Aiden's pulse and blood pressure as he plays.
- Welcome to the future of parenting, as envisaged by Cisco Systems at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week. Robert Barlow, a marketing executive, presented the scenario with animation, graphs and statistics to industry professionals.
“The technology for all this already exists,” he beamed, holding a real basketball with a sensor. Cisco can aggregate data from multiple sources to create an “orchestration layer”, he said, which will help the Internet of Everything generate trillions of dollars in the next decade.
The audience of executives and technicians from America, Europe and Asia got the message. Big data, big bucks.
What of Aiden and Foster? You could say, lucky them. Protected from predators and pornography, nudged away from harmful food and obesity, the benefits are obvious.
I say, God help them. What sort of childhood is it with every move tracked, scrutinised, logged, judged? Where you cannot wander, try something new, be spontaneous – be yourself – without issuing a beeping alert from wearable, connected technology? This is helicopter parenting at its most stultifying, a constant, hovering presence.
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Erbjudande: GPS-övervaka dina barn dygnet om för endast 2000 kronor styck - ny produkt
--NSA Propaganda Backfires … Public Trusts Government Less Than Ever--
SvaraRadera2014-01-22 Source: Washington's Blog
Nobody Likes a Liar
Americans have doubted the NSA – and Obama’s intention to rein in its spying – ever since the Snowden leaks started.
People didn’t buy Obama’s “big speech”. And see this.
Polls show that – even after the speech – Americans ain’t buying NSA’s claims.
Indeed, the only effect of the NSA and White House’s massive propaganda campaign is to destroy what little remaining trust the American people still had in their government.
Indeed, government representatives have been caught lying so often – and have so blatantly disregarded what people want to help out the fatcats – that very few people like their politicians, and people are more afraid of the government than of terrorists.
Public Doesn’t Believe NSA … NSA PR Just Makes Public Trust Government Less Than Ever was originally published on Washington's Blog
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/01/public-doesnt-believe-nsa-nsa-pr-just-makes-public-trust-government-less-ever.html
http://www.blacklistednews.com/NSA_Propaganda_Backfires_%E2%80%A6_Public_Trusts_Government_Less_Than_Ever/32211/0/38/38/Y/M.html