Lessons from Stacey on IoT’s Level Up the Smart Home

Last week, Stacey on IoT hosted the event Level Up the Smart Home, sponsored by Silicon Labs. The different talks were insightful, and Stacey and the various speakers shared their wealth of knowledge on their perspective on different topics. We had a chance to listen in on “Getting to Green,” about the impact of smart technology on the environment, and “The Dark Side of the IoT,” about the potential negatives of surveillance by smart devices.

Getting to Green

Stacey spoke with Bjorn Block, Business Area Manager for IKEA Home Smart, and Shawn Stover, Vice President of Smart Home at GE Applicances. The three discussed thinking more critically about how long a smart product lives in the home. A smart device’s life is one aspect of the challenge around sustainability. Another aspect of sustainability is energy and water conservation through IoT devices. STRATIS Sustain, enables residents, property managers, and portfolio representatives to reduce energy consumption through IoT sensors. These sensors monitor usage, mitigate waste and damage, and add value to eco-friendly housing.

The Dark Side of IoT (content warning: mention of domestic violence)

Mark Rolston, founder and chief creative officer at Argo Design and Erica Olsen, Director of the Safety Net Project at The National Network to End Domestic Violence, joined Stacey. They talked about how smart products are typically originally designed with the belief that the people who share a home are safe together, which is not an assumption that applies to everyone. Rolston and Olsen said to create safer systems, there must be different surveillance preference options available to multiple people in the home as well as protection through better policies. Security is of the utmost importance at STRATIS. Currently, a domestic violence audit is under review to ensure that anyone who uses our platform is safe and secure. This BBC article, “How your smart home devices can be turned against you,” is an informative additional resource on this topic.

There is so much to learn about in the quickly growing world of IoT and we thank Stacey on IoT for hosting this event! Speaking of events, if you are at the conference APTvirtual powered by NAA this week, come visit our booth at CommunityConnect by RealPage!