IoT news of the week for July 28, 2023

PTC’s CEO is set to step down: Jim Heppelmann, the CEO of PTC, which over the last decade has transitioned from a CAD software company to an industrial IoT software provider, will step down in February 2024. Neil Barua, president of PTC’s service lifecycle management business, will replace him as CEO. Heppelmann, who has been at PTC for 26 years with half of that as the CEO, plans to retire. (PTC)

Comcast adds indoor tracking devices for its MachineQ network: Comcast’s MachineQ Low-Power Wide-Area Network is adding a bunch of new tags that will operate on its indoor real-time location tracing network. These tags have differing sizes, durability, battery life, and performance depending on the device they’re attached to. There are tiny tags for handheld tools and larger weather-rated tags for monitoring pallets indoors and outdoors. The smallest tag for handheld devices has an 8-year battery life and an LED light that can be remotely triggered to start blinking so as to help find the object. I think I need one of those as opposed to an AirTag. (Comcast)

STMicro releases a smaller, IR motion/presence sensor: Chip firm STMicroelectronics wants to replace the bulky, passive infrared motion (PIR) sensor with a smaller, more accurate option. The STMicro STHS34PF80 sensor uses thermal transistors to detect both things in motion and stationary objects. According to this article, the device will detect humans within 10 feet while consuming less than 10 microamps. Since my old-school PIR motion sensors decide I’m gone if I am too still and require battery changes twice a year, I’m interested in products developed on this new sensor. (CNX Software)

A small acquisition in the smart metering sector: Taiwan’s Ubiik, which provides private LTE networks, has acquired New Zealand’s Mimomax Wireless. Mimomax makes MIMO radios for the utilities and energy sector and Ubik provides private LTE networks for utilities doing smart metering in Taiwan. This deal simply brings the antenna expertise under one roof and helps tie the smart metering devices closer to the private LTE network, boosting performance and likely battery life. (RCR Wireless)

Eero gets into Wi-Fi networks for apartment buildings: This week, Eero said it would provide mesh Wi-Fi and software to manage Wi-Fi for apartment owners. Kevin explains what Eero is doing and why delivering Wi-Fi for apartments is both a challenge and an opportunity. (Stacey on IoT).

Companies have 4 days to report a hack says the SEC: The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission just released new rules that require publicly traded companies to report data breaches and hacks within four days of them happening. Companies can wait up to 60 days if the attack poses a “substantial risk to national security or public safety.”  The rules don’t require companies to say what they are doing to remediate the attack, simply that the company has been attacked, what happened, and how big of an impact the attack would have. Businesses have said that this time frame is way too short for reporting the news of a breach, but I am convinced by the analogy that SEC Chair Gary Gensler made between a company reporting a catastrophic fire at a factory and the loss of millions of files. Just because a terrible occurrence is virtual doesn’t mean investors shouldn’t know, or should have to wait months for a sanitized report even after it has affected the victim’s operations. The new rules also require companies to share the steps they take to prevent attacks. If you’re making IoT gear, you should already have considerable steps in place, so I look forward to reading about them in upcoming quarterly or annual reports. (The Hacker News)

Google updates Android to prevent stalking using a tracker: After Apple’s AirTag was released people discovered them tucked into their bags or on their cars. As worries about criminals using the tags to stalk people gathered ground, Apple released features to let people know if an AirTag unaffiliated with their phone was around. This worked for folks who carried iPhones, but not everyone does, so Apple and Google teamed up to build tools so any phone could determine if a tracker (any Bluetooth tracker) was nearby. Now, Android-phone users with devices running Android 6.0 or higher can get a notification if an unaffiliated tag follows them, see the history of that tag, and even proactively scan the environment for nearby tags. I wonder if thieves might use that proactive scan to find nearby trackers and get rid of them. (Engadget)

Infineon adds new security controllers for the IoT: Chipmaker Infineon has launched a bunch of security-conscious chips dubbed Tegrion. These security controllers are made at 28 nanometers and include features such as cryptographic accelerators and a self-checking dual-core CPU.These chips are destined for the smart home, payments, industrial and smart mobility markets. (Infineon)