IoT news of the week for March 26, 2021

What to pack when your industrial plant has been hacked: In a perfect example of what might be painfully obvious for one industry but completely novel for everyone else, Leslie Carhart, a principal industrial incident responder at Dragos, has laid out what she has prepped for incident responses in industrial settings. She covers tools that might be specific to those environments, but also addresses things like safety considerations that might not be apparent. For example, you can’t always physically access all equipment without proper gear, so having that gear as part of a response kit saves time. I love reading these things because it opens up a new world and way of thinking, which could help other cybersecurity executives or even plant managers think about their own plans for responding to a cyberattack. (Dragos) — Stacey Higginbotham

My latest Thread device experience: outstanding! We discussed this on the podcast, but if you missed it, I reviewed three Eve Home devices that support Thread. I’m amazed at the simplicity and speed of the Thread network that just configures itself. Not only does my smart home data from these devices travel quickly, but the range is impressive as well; automation triggers for my smart lights are as fast as using dumb lights with a traditional light switch. Now that I’ve experienced it, I fully believe Thread is the future of the smart home. (Stacey On IoT)  — Kevin C. Tofel

Allegion Ventures invests in Mint: Allegion Venture has put money into Mint House, a startup that’s helping hotels add modern amenities such as mobile check-in and keyless entry.  It will even arrange for grocery delivery, which means travelers don’t have to engage with others during travel (which was especially relevant during the pandemic). This investment follows a trend in Allegion’s strategy of putting money into companies that are making access to buildings easier through digital services. These companies include Kasa, Robin, VergeSense, and OpenPath. (Allegion) — Stacey Higginbotham

Eaton adds Alexa to its latest smart dimmer switch: I’m more of a smart bulb person, but I really like the look of this new Wi-Fi dimmer switch from Eaton. The dimmer controls look far more intuitive to me than most alternatives. The design is sleek and the switch handles lighting up to 300W, which is more than enough in the age of LEDs. Oh, and there’s also a built-in microphone to use Alexa, plus a one-touch button to mute the mic and have a little quiet time. The switch was just announced this week, so pricing information isn’t yet available. (Eaton) — Kevin C. Tofel

Someone at SAP tries a no-code approach to IoT: Remember how I said we need the IoT to scale if we want projects to succeed? Well, that includes giving people the tools to use the data coming from installed sensors. But there aren’t enough developers to take all of the data coming off connected devices and apply it to new business use cases. That’s why no-code development tools are interesting to me. How easy is it for me to measure a problem and build a fix for that problem without having a Computer Science degree? An SAP employee answers this by hooking up an ESP32 board to SAP’s IoT service with just a laptop and a little coding. (SAP) — Stacey Higginbotham

Here’s a unique approach to LIDAR: Baraja, an Australian-based maker of LIDAR sensors, raised $31 million in funding this week, so I took a look at why. After all, there are plenty of LIDAR companies that offer their wares to automotive and smart robot makers. But it turns out Baraja’s approach is quite different. Typically a LIDAR sensor has many moving parts so that it can “see” and map objects in a wide field of vision, if not a full 360 degrees. Baraja only uses one moving mechanical part and instead maps lightwaves through a prism to view objects around it. I’m not suggesting that’s worth a $31 million Round B, but it is pretty darn innovative. (TechCrunch) — Kevin C. Tofel

COVID-19 screening via a smart device is coming: This week, the FDA authorized a new AI-powered armband that will screen users for COVID-19. This wearable comes from Tiger Tech Solutions and uses light sensors to monitor blood flow. There are plenty of devices that do this already, but none of them measure the amount of blood coagulation, which is a potential sign of having COVID. Medical research indicates that if your blood is clotting more than normal, the COVID-19 virus could be the reason. Early results are promising, with the FDA saying the device “matched up with the findings of diagnostic tests 98.6% of the time in finding positive cases in a hospital and 94.5% of the time when ruling out negative cases.” (Fierce Biotech) — Kevin C. Tofel

Researcher gets grant to use IoT data for AR: A Duke researcher won a $550,000 award for her plan to use data from connected devices in the home to improve the quality of augmented reality. For example, if a robot vacuum already has a map of a home, why not use its data to try to tell an AR system where to anchor a space for AR gameplay. Or because AR looks better in rooms with enough light, maybe the connected lights in a room could work to establish the optimal brightness for sharing images in AR. (WRAL TechWire) — Stacey Higginbotham