There has been an explosion in the availability of digital devices, which have the term ‘Smart' connected with them. Being stupid humans we might believe these products labelled as ‘Smart', are intelligent, even a necessity. What does the intelligent ‘Smart Device', have to offer? The answer is a pretty simple. The ‘Smart Device' can have vast potential uses and benefits. However, it also has the ability to put the stupid human at risk. These risks are multiple and varied in nature, but the stupid human generally will not realise or even acknowledge these risks, until it is far too late.
Some of the new devices being introduced for the home use Artificial Intelligence, or AI. The problem with AI, is that it needs to be given a positive and rich source of information to learn from. Taybot was a chatter bot created by Microsoft to mimic a 19-year-old girl. It went live on Twitter on the 23rd of March 2016. The idea was, it would learn from it's interactions with the stupid humans on Twitter. However, after only 16 hours, Taybot had to be taken down of Twitter by Microsoft.
In that very short period of time, the Taybot had generated a considerable amount of it's own Tweets, which were filled with hate, racist and sexually explicit comments. This content had been created by Taybot as a direct result of the online content it was exposed to and interacted with in less than 24 hours. The stupid humans who engaged with Taybot on Twitter, had transformed Taybot into racist.
Such was the impact and importance of the information gathered in 16 short hours and the 96,000 Tweets Taybot created, there was a terrible realisation, given enough time, any sufficiently advanced AI interacting with the stupid humans will become racist and subsequently have to be terminated.
Even Alexa can sometimes get it wrong
Many families have welcomed Amazon's Alexa in to the home. So what could go wrong here with a very advanced AI? Again the stupid humans underestimate the ability of the ‘Smart Device' when it comes to the protection of their children from harmful online content. In this perfect example and incredibly funny clip, a small young child simply asks Alexa, to play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. What could possibly go wrong?
The stupid humans have a long history of embracing technology, without considering the safety aspect or potential dangers or exposure risks. One incredibly dangerous and very real threat looming large over all of us stupid humans and our children now, is the invasiveness of the ‘Smart Device' being embracing. Every stupid humans expects and has a right to their privacy being protected. However the stupid human will surrender their privacy immediately, when product's contain the word ‘Smart' or ‘Intelligent' on the box.
The Health Insurance Social Engineering Scam
While the ‘Smart' technology can appear to make life simple by telling you your fridge is empty, or that you have walked 10,000 steps today, there is a huge unseen cost. The stupid human's Personal Information.
This week an Irish Health Insurance Company, Irish Life announced plans to give €250 back off your Insurance Premium, if you wear a fitness tracker. This type of incentive is being adopted from similar plans initiated in the US. One of the largest American insurers John Hancock has confirmed, it intends to cease underwriting traditional life insurance and now only sell interactive policies that track fitness and health data of its customers through their wearable devices and smartphones.
This move now forces the stupid human policy holder to be more health conscious, this is a positive move. However, having to disclose all of their personal medical data being gathered by the Smart Device over to a Health Insurer, who will profit and possibly discriminate on the basis of the information gathered, has very negative implications for the stupid human.
Consider the impact of putting a ‘Smart Device' on the wrist of every stupid human. This device is now consistently reminding them to meet targets set by the device, or perhaps the Insurance Company, to ensure either a monetary savings, a reward, or a penalty, meaning higher costs, or possibly even a rejection of their Health Insurance application or policy.
This would inevitably cause a little anxiety. This leads to stress. If the stupid humans health targets are not being met, or perhaps their partner or children or not as active as they should be there are penalties. This stress combines with all of the other stressful life events the stupid humans are experiencing may eventually turn in to depression. Combining technology and self-esteem does not appear to be producing the positive impact the stupid humans had hoped for. Mental illnesses are becoming increasingly part of the stupid human's lives. Not because they are stupid humans, but from the intensity of being constantly connected to an online world of misconceptions.
Data Breaches
The next question to ask is who gets to have access to all the stupid humans data and what will the data be used for. Historically data such as health and medical data enables positive advances for the stupid humans, except when companies can use this data to categorise risk based on the information the stupid human has innocently handed over. The stupid human also now needs to consider how secure will all this personal data be. More importantly not if, but when will this data be used by third parties and leaked to other stupid humans who should not have access to it. Incredibly, you now have a greater chance of becoming a victim of online crime than becoming a victim of a real world crime.
Could the stupid human with the wearable Smart Device, eventually end up speaking to a Chat-bot looking for health insurance, being advised of a premium increased as a direct result of not maintaining an average of 5,000 steps a day? Could the stupid human be part of a demographic, who now face a difficulty in securing health cover from any company, once age, illness or a disability means they are no longer able to maintain the required level of fitness or activity?
Stupid humans are rapidly becoming the weakness in the Human and Smart Device combination. The stupid human has mistaken the meaning of the term ‘Smart Device'. It would be far more appropriate to use the term, ‘Dumb Device'. The stupid human urgently needs to become the Smart Human who selectively chooses which Dumb Device will be used and what dumb application will be installed without exposing the Smart Human or Smart Family to risk.
Team #cotdage