Barb Darrow

[Commentary] The latest Edward Snowden disclosures show that the National Security Agency vacuumed up far more data on far more Americans. In fact 9 out of 10 of people whose accounts were caught up in the data dragnet were not targets of any investigation.

Now we’ll wait for the reactions to roll in from US tech companies that are trying to paint themselves as worthy stewards of customer information.

Industry execs ranging from Cisco CEO John Chambers, Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith and HP EVP Bill Veghte have all said that US government data collection has put tech vendors behind the eight-ball as they try to sell technology -- from networking hardware to cloud computing.

Google, Facebook and other companies are pressuring the government to be more transparent -- or let them be more transparent -- about what customer data intelligence agencies ask for.

But let’s face it: People who are surprised by the latest Snowden disclosures should not be. Previous NSA whistleblowers already told the world that the NSA has been collecting their email and phone conversations for a quite some time.

A Q&A with Lance Crosby, the executive charged with IBM/SoftLayer’s cloud push. Maybe the National Security Agency did us a favor. Sure, news of its insatiable data snooping got nearly everyone’s knickers in a twist, but seriously, isn’t this a valuable teaching moment?

Crosby certainly thinks so. He acknowledged that customers outside the US often ask about securing their data from government eyes. His answer? Don’t focus on who’s snooping, protect your data from anyone.

“My response is protect your data against any third party -- whether it’s the NSA, other governments, hackers, terrorists, whatever…” he noted. “I say let’s stop worrying about the NSA and start talking about encryption and VPNs and all the ways you can protect yourself. Yes, the NSA got caught, but they’re not the first and won’t be the last.”

A court ruling over search warrants means continued trouble for US cloud providers eager to build their businesses abroad.

In his ruling, US Magistrate Judge James Francis found that big Internet service providers (ISPs) -- including name brands Microsoft and Google -- must comply with valid warrants to turn over customer information, including e-mails, even if that material resides in data centers outside the US, according to several reports.

Microsoft recently challenged such a warrant and this ruling was the response. In a blog post, Microsoft Deputy General Counsel David Howard characterized this as a necessary first step in what will likely be a long battle.

The ruling basically upholds the status quo for US companies who have tried to reassure foreign governments that data residing in their data centers outside the US will be safe from overreach by US law enforcement or security agencies.

[Commentary] If you thought the in-house data silos of the client-server era were a nightmare, get ready for the hairball that the Internet of things could engender.

As tens of billions of “things” -- sensors, machines, mobile devices -- get connected to the Internet and to each other, there will be huge value in the data they generate across applications ranging from agriculture, to senior care, to public works. But there’s a lot of heavy lifting to do first.

We know we can collect the data -- but how to process it, analyze it and share it securely in a way that makes sense and doesn’t give people the heebie-jeebies? Some parts of the Internet infrastructure are ready for this IoT onslaught already.

“If just 15 to 18 percent of all dark fiber is lit up now, there’s still tremendous amount of capacity available,” said Chad Jones, VP of LogMeIn’s Xively IoT business. “It’s not that we need the pipes, but we do need a ton of infrastructure atop the pipes. The next thing is we’ll need a bunch of clouds meeting different requirements from all these data sources and we’ll need business intelligence and stream processors etc.,” he noted.

While dozens of startups pour time and money into developing mobile health devices for the young, hale and hearty, they might be better off going grayer.

The opportunity to sell technology to senior citizens is huge now and will only get bigger as more of us age into that segment. Which vendors will be best positioned to capitalize on this opportunity -- a handful of early movers that are already in the market, or vendors like Fitbit or Jawbone that focus on younguns?

“Developers making technologies for the 20- and 30-somethings are missing a huge opportunity to supply the 100-million-plus people aged 50 and over in this country,” Laurie Orlov, an analyst with Age In Place Technology, said in an interview.

She estimates that this market is worth $2 billion now and will hit $20 billion by 2020. Semico Research puts the number higher, forecasting that the market for gear like remote health monitors, oximeters, glucose monitors, medication reminders, heart rate monitors, safety alert bracelets, etc. will hit $30 billion by 2017.

You want more evidence? Research released in October conducted by Oxford Economics for the AARP said that Americans over 50 spend $4.6 trillion annually, with the ripple effect of that spending hitting $7.1 trillion per year.