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Customers can't evaluate security of IoT devices and, furthermore, they can't even evaluate what the downside of an insecure device is. So my printer is insecure- what does that mean for me? How much should I care?

At least with cars, you know what an unsafe car can do (kill you) and it still took Ralph Nader's book and citizen pressure to set up a federal agency to oversee car safety. Also, even when most people know that seatbelts are a good idea, we still have seatbelt laws because they mean fewer people die.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unsafe_at_Any_Speed?wprov=sf...



They can for some of them if you give them this pic from Brian Krebs:

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/10/the-scrap-value-of-a-hac...

Got through to a lot of them that way. They were more likely to practice better computer security or buy less "smart" products that don't need to be smart.


That pic made my eyes glaze over. It's a good concept, poor execution.


Maybe they shouldn't have those devices then.


Lets evaluate what makes more sense, OEMs and programmers that have an understanding of the software and hardware and the programming they undertake being responsible for for their own work.

Or blaming the users for not understanding what is essentially an black box that is basically an entirely unknown quantity before (and after) you buy it, often even with when the user has very high technical skill.

I know a lot of programmers are allergic to taking responsibility for their products, maybe its time that changed.




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