News

After the purchase of Roomba, is the information of our homes safe?

Can you imagine that the mere fact of turning on the popular Roomba vacuum cleaner at home in order to finish with dirt, implies vacuuming up information about your home? Or about your office, company… wherever you use it. This is what twenty of organizations concerned about data privacy after Amazon has acquired iRobot, maker of the Roomba.

The purchase took place last August and has already been challenged by the US Federal Trade Commission. The whistleblowers believe that allowing Amazon to take control of a smart home device business could mean having access to consumer data and habits. At the same time it would also endanger fair competition, open markets and consumer privacy itself.

In its operation, Roomba already has details about the layout and the number of rooms or the placement of furniture. A concern on the part of these consumer organizations who believe that it could simply be the tip of the iceberg of future actions so that Amazon gathers truthful and detailed information about the person who lives or works in that space concrete.

Plus, Roomba wouldn’t be alone in many homes. Since she would have another Amazon companion in many houses, the very popular Alexa. “If a consumer only owns three Alexa devices but has five rooms, Amazon could move to advertise additional Alexa products for those other rooms,” they criticize, adding, “once Amazon figures out what rooms they are, what they’re shaped like, and what furniture is in them.” , then they can try and figure out how they can get you to have an Alexa that works in that room.”

Concern about the data that Amazon may collect

In their petition to the US Federal Trade Commission, consumer and data privacy organizations including Fight for the Future, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Georgetown Law’s Center on Privacy and Technology expressed concern about the purchase. of Roomba accusing Amazon of wanting to carry out a “intrusive home system” in order to collect data from connected home devices, “which could include private details about our habits and our health that would endanger human rights and security”.

Nowadays, a quarter of US households already have an Alexa smart devicewhich is why Amazon dominates the market for these home devices.

And it is that, for years, the technological giant bases part of its business model in acquiring its rivals. Already in 2018, it was done with the manufacturer of Ring doorbells. Today, Amazon already sells as many doorbell units as its four biggest competitors combined thanks to its low pricing policy.

But what else is Amazon looking for with the iRobot acquisition? As these organizations argue, subscription revenue is increasingly important for companies that need long-term engagement and revenue. For what Amazon could turn your iRobot purchase into a subscription service. “You could imagine paying for Roomba on a subscription where replacement parts are shipped to you automatically, new brushes are shipped to you automatically, and in fact the product itself would be cheap to make up for all of this.”

And at the bottom of the matter, an important figure: iRobot has a customer base of 30 million users. Now owned by Amazon.

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *