Security News Roomba Maker Preparing to Sell Maps of Your Home to Advertisers

frogboy

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Roomba maker iRobot Corp announced future plans to sell maps of users' homes to advertisers, according to an interview iRobot CEO Colin Angle gave yesterday.
There's no deadline set for when this will happen, but investors are itching at the possible earnings, hence the reason why iRobot stock grew to $102 per share in June 2017 compared to only $35 in the same month last year.
Roomba vacuums have been mapping homes since 2015

Roomba autonomous robotic vacuum cleaners have been on the market since 2002, and are an undeniable and overwhelming success.
In 2015, iRobot started selling Roomba models capable of mapping homes, so the vacuums would know where they should go and stop bumping into furniture or other things.
These maps have been kept on the device, but iRobot plans to upload them to its servers, and soon, sell them to online advertisers like Amazon, Apple, or Google.
Primary buyers aren't your regular ad companies, but makers of smart home voice assistants, like Amazon (Alexa), Apple (Siri), and Google (Home). These companies could buy this data and combine it with the telemetry they get from their devices and built user profiles that they can sell down the road to classic advertising companies, or offer advertising inside their products.

Read More. Roomba Maker Preparing to Sell Maps of Your Home to Advertisers
 

Deletedmessiah

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Roomba maker iRobot Corp announced future plans to sell maps of users' homes to advertisers, according to an interview iRobot CEO Colin Angle gave yesterday.
There's no deadline set for when this will happen, but investors are itching at the possible earnings, hence the reason why iRobot stock grew to $102 per share in June 2017 compared to only $35 in the same month last year.
Roomba vacuums have been mapping homes since 2015

Roomba autonomous robotic vacuum cleaners have been on the market since 2002, and are an undeniable and overwhelming success.
In 2015, iRobot started selling Roomba models capable of mapping homes, so the vacuums would know where they should go and stop bumping into furniture or other things.
These maps have been kept on the device, but iRobot plans to upload them to its servers, and soon, sell them to online advertisers like Amazon, Apple, or Google.
Primary buyers aren't your regular ad companies, but makers of smart home voice assistants, like Amazon (Alexa), Apple (Siri), and Google (Home). These companies could buy this data and combine it with the telemetry they get from their devices and built user profiles that they can sell down the road to classic advertising companies, or offer advertising inside their products.

Read More. Roomba Maker Preparing to Sell Maps of Your Home to Advertisers
Damn! I can't say I'm much surprised. This is gonna get even worse. Use of webcam coming soon. They'll measure your body parts for "the better user experience"
 

SHvFl

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This is beyond stupid so if it happens their sales is going to drop like a bomb. Good luck to them after that.

Damn! I can't say I'm much surprised. This is gonna get even worse. Use of webcam coming soon. They'll measure your body parts for "the better user experience"
I have a certain body part i would have no issues if they measured it. :p:cool:;)
 

ispx

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Use of webcam coming soon. They'll measure your body parts for "the better user experience

they probably have already done that. what do you think the camera of your smart tv is doing, while you are engrossed watching hbo?

I have a certain body part i would have no issues if they measured it

hush. this is a family oriented community :D :p ;)
 

SHvFl

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they probably have already done that. what do you think the camera of your smart tv is doing, while you are engrossed watching hbo?



hush. this is a family oriented community :D :p ;)
Not really. The forum is 16+ and i don't think them measuring my big toe is an issue. People that are 16+ have seen a toe before. :rolleyes:
 
F

ForgottenSeer 58943

Roomba is losing a lot of market right now.

Especially with cheaper and as good (if not better) alternatives.

I have an Ecovacs N79 on each floor of my home that auto-scheduled clean nightly at 5PM and work perfectly without the spying nonsense and half the price of Roomba. Operating in WLAN mode keeps them off of the internets.
 

Arequire

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It's all fine and dandy to let their robot map my house and sell it to advertisers but when I turn up at a iRobot executive's house and offer them £200 to take sketches of the inside and then come back the next day trying to sell them a vase to go in that empty spot next to their fireplace it's all "trespassing" and "phoning the police". :rolleyes:
 

Transhumana

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Welcome to the wild times when you can't even trust your vacuum cleaner. :D
What's next, toothbrush collecting data on your dental health and selling it to advertisers? These days you can't even buy a loaf of bread without thorough reading of ToS. o_O
 

Fritz

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Looks like he finally realized that telling customers they're just data cattle isn't the smartest move really.

Too bad the intentions are clear and if you read it thoroughly, they fully intend to go through, they just don't know how to word it nicely yet.
 

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