Post by Creotronics

🚨 “It’s just a vacuum cleaner… what could go wrong?” In the last few weeks, two stories really made me pause. A robot vacuum was caught sending large amounts of data to the cloud — including telemetry that maps your home 😲 and even unencrypted WiFi credentials (2× 😲). The owner (an IT professional 😁) blocked this data on his network, but left software updates untouched. One week later, the vacuum stopped working 🤨. After some back-and-forth with the repair center, the company remotely killed the device entirely. No telemetry + no WiFi credentials = no cleaning (3× 😲). A similar issue surfaced in Norway, where authorities discovered remote access and a potential kill-switch in imported electric buses. Modern buses carry countless sensors and cameras — but do we know where that data ends up? And what happens when the manufacturer can remotely disable an entire fleet? These stories sound extreme, but they highlight a growing reality: everything is connected, and we rarely question what that really means. As consumers, we often invite connected devices into our homes without thinking twice. But that vacuum cleaner might have cameras or microphones. It might be collecting far more data than expected. And it sits right on your home network — next to your laptop, NAS, or work devices. As someone who builds electronics for a living, I love what smart devices can do. But “smart” shouldn’t mean “always online” or “full access for the manufacturer.” When I design hardware, safety and privacy aren’t optional — they’re requirements (and mandatory in Europe). I wish more products followed the same principles. So here’s my message: 🔹 Be critical when buying connected devices. Do they really need the internet to function? 🔹 Know what data they collect. A camera on a vacuum cleaner shouldn’t surprise anyone — but it should still concern us. 🔹 And if you build devices yourself: design for security from day one. It’s not an afterthought. Connectivity is powerful, but it also creates risk. A bit more awareness — from both consumers and creators — goes a long way. Links to the articles in the comments. #CyberSecurity #IoTSecurity #DataPrivacy #SecurityByDesign #EmbeddedSystems #HardwareEngineering