The Internet of Things will be as corrupt as the companies that control it

[Commentary] Marcelo Rinesi writing for the Institute for Ethics & Emerging Technologies on the coming wave of “defeat software” in the Internet of Things (IoT): "The temptation to teach products to lie strategically will be as impossible to resist for companies in the near future as it has been to Volkswagen, steep as their punishment seems to be."

I’ve been pretty hard on the IoT mostly due to dumb, overpriced devices calling themselves "smart" in order to ride the hype and then profit off a hapless public. But, Rinesi’s viewpoint is downright dire by comparison, and a warning to government regulators who will fail to see the rise of IoT as they failed to see the rise of the Internet itself. VW was the first to get caught using software to defeat environmental testing, but there’s every reason to believe it won’t be the last. When everything we own is smart, how can we be sure our things are also honest?