PPB February 2018

| FEBRUARY 2018 | 59 THINK track anything with a find- my-phone-type app. These products and hundreds more are all possible in what our industry could call the Internet of Promotional Things (IoPT). In time, there are bound be IoPT features added to a wide range of industry categories, from pens to drinkware to bags to apparel, as developers find meaningful ways to reimagine the customer experience and broaden marketing opportunities. But the benefits of IoT and IoPT may come at a price. These connected consumer products are raising serious concerns for regulators around the globe as issues of cybersecurity and privacy abound. Consumers have already been subjected to hacking incidents with IoT control devices in automobiles, heart regulators, baby monitors, cameras, oil pipelines and credit card scanners, to name a few. Promotional professionals should take the time to educate themselves about IoT now, before the products become plentiful in the industry, so that when they begin to appear you will be better able to make informed decisions and protect your clients’ brands. Only four percent of the world was online in 1999 when Kevin Ashton, a British scientist working at Proctor and Gamble (P&G), coined the term “Internet of Things.” It was the title of a presentation he gave on the use of radio frequency identification (RFID) tags for P&G’s supply chain. Ashton was convinced that life would be greatly improved if computers weren’t dependent on humans for data entry—that electronic sensors like RFID tags weremuchmore efficient. He wrote, “If we had computers that knew everything there was to know about things—using data they gathered without any help fromus—we would be able to track and count everything, and greatly reduce waste, loss and cost. We would knowwhen things needed replacing, repairing or recalling, and whether they were fresh or past their best. We need to empower computers with their ownmeans of gathering information, so they can see, hear and smell the world for themselves, in all its random glory. RFID and sensor technology enable computers to observe, identify and understand the world—without the limitations of human-entered data.” That same year, Neil Gross wrote in Business Week , “In the next century, planet Earth will don an electronic skin. It will use the internet as a scaffold to support and transmit its sensations. This skin is already being stitched together. It consists of millions of embedded electronic measuring devices: thermostats, pressure gauges, pollution detectors, cameras, microphones, glucose sensors, EKGs, electroencephalographs. These will probe and monitor cities and endangered species, the atmosphere, our ships, highways and fleets of trucks, our conversations, our bodies—even our dreams.” The Internet of Things described by Ashton and Gross is in full bloom today, according to the Pew Research Center, with IoT devices pervasive in cars, voice-activated assistants, appliances, security systems, health-monitoring devices, road sensors and personal fitness trackers. And with the crop of new products introduced at the Consumer Electronics Show this past month, IoT features have begun to emerge in cameras, door locks, door bells, beauty mirrors, window blinds, toothbrushes, hairbrushes, wine bottle sleeves, umbrellas and dozens of other products. Research firm Gardner estimates that 8.4 billion connected “things” were in use worldwide in 2017, and that number will grow to more than 20 billion by the year 2020. But, according to Pew, “the very connectedness of the IoT leaves it open to security and safety vulnerabilities.” It is these vulnerabilities that fuel regulators’ concerns. At the November 2017 ICPHSO International Training Workshop held in Tokyo, Japan, regulators from the U.S., Europe and Japan participated in panel discussions on IoT security risks. Anne Marie Buerkle, acting chair of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), addressed the issue directly in her keynote, stating that cybersecurity in IoT devices has become one of CPSC’s highest priorities and is specifically noted in the Agency’s 2017 Report on Emerging Technologies. “But we cannot solve these issues by ourselves,” Buerkle said. To address them successfully, she emphasized, will take a coordinated effort by regulators worldwide. This will take time as the issues are complex, the opportunities for collaboration are limited and there are many more questions than answers. Examples of the safety issues CPSC is concerned about were The benefits of IoT and IoPTmay come at a price. These connected consumer products are raising serious concerns for regulators around the globe as issues of cybersecurity and privacy abound.