Remontoire

Philips Hue will force users to upload their data to Hue cloud

https://lemmy.world/post/5718256

Philips Hue will force users to upload their data to Hue cloud - Lemmy.world

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/5717757 [https://lemmy.world/post/5717757] > Today’s story is about Philips Hue by Signify. They will soon start forcing accounts on all users and upload user data to their cloud. For now, Signify says you’ll still be able to control your Hue lights locally as you’re currently used to, but we don’t know if this may change in the future. The privacy policy allows them to store the data and share it with partners.

Sep 25, 2023 at 5:34pmWeb
Show threadBri Guy Sep 25, 2023
Yep, I started getting the prompts to create an account to continue using their app…
Show threadBjörnSep 25, 2023
Show threadchocoboiSep 25, 2023
Does that mean they’re abandoning zigbee and not adopting Matter/Thread?
Show threadwillyaSep 25, 2023
They’ve already adopted matter.
Show threadShunkWSep 25, 2023
I’m struggling to understand the reasoning behind this. Like these are just lightbulbs right? What’s the value in that data that I’m not seeing
Show threadSpaceNoodleSep 25, 2023
They’re light bulbs, they emit light, it’s literally what you’re seeing
Show threadNindelofochoSep 25, 2023
sorry, alphabet bought humor last month.
Show threadpharioSep 25, 2023

…are you serious?

There would be so much data in understanding people’s light usage. For example, you could figure out how late or early people get up, number of people living in a house, how crowded the house is, how many lights are used per room, etc etc. it would be a gold mine of information.

Let’s say you’re a home automaton designer. You want to design devices to be used in the home, but in order to design such devices, you need enough of a stockpile of user data. This lightbulb data would be incredible valuable.

You can probably even analyse the data and determine things like whether someone is watching tv late at night.

Show threadbooleanSep 25, 2023

also, room names. You can get a pretty good idea of a house's interior layout from the names and sequence of lights being activated. The ongoing attempts to map data to the physical world.

Sonos did this a few years ago and there was a similar outcry. I have stopped using Sonos devices too.

Show threadCorkyskogSep 25, 2023
Oh God, I have an odd sense of humor. I would probably have the cops called on me lol.
Show threadGregorechSep 25, 2023
How does a randomized system mess with that data. I only have two hue light, an under cabinet strip. My Echo turns them on and off randomly when I set it in the away mode. Will Phillips get both sets of data? Will Daddy Jeff share? Will he just buy Phillips and cut out the middle man?
Show threadCorkyskogSep 25, 2023
Maybe they will buy both sets just to confirm the accuracy of the data?
Show threadtheneverfoxSep 26, 2023

“I randomize user submitted data to the corporation selling it, how could this possibly be a problem?”

If you’re smart enough to mangle the data you give them, you’re smart enough to understand the issue here.

Get rid of your sunk cost bias and think it through

Show threadxkforceSep 25, 2023
Gold mine how? How the fuck does knowing when I go to sleep help them sell things to people? Explain.
Show threadkilleronthecornerSep 25, 2023

It builds a profile of you, and then they combine that with thousands of other profiles to build demographic profiles and then they sell this data to other firms or use it to further tune their own advertising services.

The same as pretty much every other company on the Internet. If it didn’t work they wouldn’t do it. Some people not understanding this due to over simplified examples makes no difference to that.

Show threadxkforceSep 25, 2023
Thats a bad assumption. Companies do dumb things all the time. i.e thinking that what theyre doing works is not the same thing as what theyre doing actually benefiting them.
Show threadCorkyskogSep 25, 2023

If it didn’t work they wouldn’t do it.

That’s not necessarily true, people do things that don’t work all the time, sometimes for a long time. There have been millions if not billions of dollars dumped into shit that doesn’t work. Using charts to predict the stock market doesn’t work, yet you can find people still doing it to this day.

Show threadclgohSep 25, 2023
For example you can be targeted with food ads when you’re likely in the kitchen.
Show threadcheery_coffeeSep 25, 2023

You don’t need the individual light bulb data for that, just the user accounts and device IDs would tell you who lives in the house, their relationships, and you can use the IP from the app’s analytics eventing to approximate location to estimate household wealth.

The lightbulb data sounds fun, but not valuable.

Show threadPersnickityPenguinSep 25, 2023

Considering a lot of people are home all the time, probably not worth all that much.

I think people overestimate how much their behavior and data is actually worth. Companies only care as far as targeting ads to people. But 95% of the time those ads don’t actually do anything anyways.

Show threadHyperrealitySep 25, 2023

Location data, when you're home/not home, which room you're likely in/not in. Data that costs almost nothing to produce, but can be sold for millions.

Bulbs tell them when you're in the kitchen, bathroom, bedroom, etc. Relatively easy to combine it with smart tv, smart watch, security cam, and app/phone data to identify you exactly.

Combine it all and it's likely they'd be able to identify you exactly and identify what you're doing with a high degree of certainty, then micro-target you with ads or propaganda.

Honestly, there comes a point where you'd have more privacy shoving a camera up your ass. Less privacy than the DDR.

Show threaddeweydecibelSep 25, 2023

A lot of people don’t seem to understand that each individual but of data is often not valuable in itself, but it is as part of a whole.

Basically, everything there is to know about you is a jigsaw puzzle. Many companies out there want that finished piece, so they pay a premium for each individual piece of the jigsaw, and the companies you give your data to everyday are selling those pieces.

Show threadhardypartSep 25, 2023
"Big dat"a has become a buzz word, but it’s a potent and also frightening thing.
Show threadCorkyskogSep 25, 2023
This might be a stupid question, and I don’t know if anyone would even have the knowledge to answer… but is this data ever audited? Other than possible lawsuits, what prevents me from randomly generating data points for my customers and selling them to these companies? I assume they are cross referencing with other data sets and they could catch on quickly?
Show threadcheery_coffeeSep 25, 2023

When you sell fraudulent data you get sued for fraud. You can sell low quality data if you advertise it as such.

If you create fraudulent data like adnausium you’ll likely just get banned from Google.

A lot of this data is given for free in exchange for analytics from FB or Google on ad conversion…

Show threadGorkSep 25, 2023
Intelligence / espionage agents will have a field day with this kind of info.
Show threadNumber1SummerJamSep 25, 2023
As an added bonus, anything with unnecessary wireless functionality can easily be hacked, controlled and monitored by anyone savvy enough
Show threadcheery_coffeeSep 25, 2023

It would be hella cyberpunk for someone to hack lightbulbs, install IPFS on them, and set up free storage for everyone.

Somebody would fill it all with goatse bitmaps or random numbers or something, but for a fleeting moment the internet would be weird again.

Show threadheyoniSep 26, 2023
And now you can do it with curl!
Show threadcheery_coffeeSep 25, 2023

Likely they want detailed user data and what devices you use, and they want to cross reference that with geolocation so they can upsell you stuff.

I would say it’s likely they’ll start serving ads in the app and “recommending” you other services or things like a subscription. Any app that you have to look at will get ads these days, just look at Uber.

This is why I bought IKEA bulbs that are dumb. I avoid anything that uses an app, because it will update itself to make a new thing sell better.

Show threadpomodoro_longbreakSep 25, 2023

I can think of a few companies / products that would love to know that you’re in the bathroom every couple hours, for instance.

Or even anonymised, a company or study might want to buy “average Nova Scotian time spent in living room on weekends”

Big data is worth big $$$

Show threadStovetopSep 25, 2023
Glad I still have the old bridge which is not compatible with the current app, and so they offer the legacy app separately. Though I assume it’s only a matter of time before the bulbs I have die and new bulbs require the new bridge.
Show threadDaroradSep 25, 2023
Yep, glad I have my bridge blocked off from the internet, so they can’t force an update
Show threadClassyHatterSep 25, 2023
I think the bulbs should work with any ZigBee compatible bridge.
Show threadBuelldozerSep 25, 2023
Supposedly they will but according to others you lose some of the fine grained color control without the Hue app. I can’t say for sure because I don’t have any Hue bulbs.
Show threadNegativeLookBehindSep 25, 2023
Hue can go fuck yourself, Phillip
Show threadTealSep 25, 2023

I’m not going to create an account. What I will be doing is looking for an alternative setup that is simple and completely local or just go back to traditional led bulbs.

This is easy for me with just one room using Hue. I feel for those who have them for all or most lighting around their home.

Show threadLrdThndrSep 25, 2023

A raspberry pi4, Home Assistant software, a zigbee dongle, and any zigbee-compatible smart bulb.

By default, the traffic never leaves your local network, and all your smart-crap still works if the internet goes out. At one point, it had a learning curve like a brick wall, but over the last year or two, they’ve done a spectacular job of improving the user experience. it’s still not perfect, but it’s far better than the commercial alternatives and won’t harvest your entire life for metadata it can sell.

Show threadTealSep 25, 2023
Thanks LrdThndr, I’ll be looking into this setup. :)
Show threadEyesEyesBabySep 25, 2023
Home Assistant on a Raspberry Pi with a Zigbee dongle and zigbe2mqtt. Your Hue bulb will work just fine. You can even mix them with Ikea / Aqara / Ali / Tuya stuff if you’d like.
Show threadTealSep 25, 2023
That sounds pretty good. I’ll look into this, thank you!
Show thread_number8_Sep 25, 2023
oh wow. i have the GE cync bulbs, everyone says hue is better [which may well be true, the cync app is complete ass + trying to connect / troubleshoot] but maybe this evens things
Show threadjust another devSep 25, 2023
The app rating in Google is currently 4.5 stars. I did my part in leaving a review, and got a nice “As our features grow…” pasta reply.
Show threadRentlarSep 25, 2023
Being able to downgrade apps for reasons like this are why I probably won’t ever leave Android.
Show threadDoucheBagMcSwagSep 25, 2023
“Please update the app to continue using HUE features”
Show threadRentlarSep 26, 2023

AaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaAaaaaAaaa

That’s really all I have to say to that message.

Show threadDoucheBagMcSwagSep 26, 2023

Android is going to potentially get worse too in terms of sideloading

lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/4840974

LaLiga "Talks to Google" About Deleting Piracy Apps From a Million Phones * TorrentFreak - Divisions by zero

Show threadGorkSep 25, 2023

Ooh I can’t wait for the new Philips Hue® lighting monthly subscription service, where with a low fee we can access all of our standard lighting IOT with the basic subscription plan and colored lighting with the premium subscription!

Let the enshittification begin.

Show threadSerinusSep 25, 2023
They can sell colors and themes as DLC! Cosmetics for your home!
Show threadAppoxoSep 25, 2023
Damn…halo Infinite beqt you to that.
Show threadHughJanusSep 25, 2023
I tried to play this game yesterday. Guess what? Requires you to sign into a MS account to even start the game. I don’t wanna live on this planet anymore.
Show threadHamartiogonicSep 26, 2023
They could also have lootboxes you could buy with HueCoins, a new and shiny blockchain backed in-game currency. From the boxes you would get different colors you could use to decorate your home with. Then you could also use the existing colors to craft new ones. If the RNG didn’t your course just buy the colors you want. It’s a win-win for everyone!
Show threadJackbyDevSep 26, 2023
Yo, what if you could own Red! Be sure to get the NFT of your favorite color!
Show threadbmoneySep 26, 2023
stahhhp
Show threadHamartiogonicSep 27, 2023
Oh, we’re just getting warmed up here. Didn’t even mention the system of upgrading HueCoins to different tiers, decaying crafting materials, convoluted system of currencies in each tier, upgrading lootboxes, upgrading the RNG etc.
Show threadcheery_coffeeSep 25, 2023

But now you’ll never be able to set your room to Baby Yoda Green, Mando Mauve, or New England Patriots Nautical Blue during the big game!

Show your support for your teams and favourite characters, for only $4.99 a month, or $59 a year (a generous savings)!

Premium members can link their Disney+, Xbox, and Spotify accounts for $9.99 a month.

Don’t forget to light up your feed with our new vibrant social media section!

Show threadRiikkaTheIcePrincessSep 25, 2023

Don’t forget to light up your feed with our new vibrant social media section!

I'm gonna vom :P

Show threadJackbyDevSep 26, 2023
Folks who don’t owe Hue might not realize how close to home this hits. They have a bunch of official Star Wars shit in their Hue Labs area.
Show threadrtxnSep 25, 2023

A few years ago, I declared to my family that if they bring any “smart” appliances into the house, they (the appliances) would get the sledgehammer. They (the family) didn’t understand why.

Now they understand.

Show threadEyesEyesBabySep 25, 2023
Home Assistant is the way. It even brought my old Music Flow speaker back to life!