This week we cover the Ericsson mobility report that offers some stats on cellular IoT connections, including the surprising nugget that we won’t see 4G/5G connections surpass 2G/3G connections until some time next year. Then we hit another report. This one is from NPR and covers the state of audio and smart speakers. It proves that growth is slowing for smart speakers and that we may not do as many things with voice as we think. In dystopian news we cover China using COVID tracking apps to lock down protesters, and Microsoft stopping sales of some facial recognition tools. In new product news we talk about the latest Philips Hue gear, a new material that could generate electricity for wearables, and new MCUs from NXP. We also address the closure of SmartDry and explain how Google’s update on the Nest Max Hub may break your Nest x Yale lock. We end by answering a listener question about more accurate motion sensors.
Our guest this week is Daniel dos Santos, head of security research at Vedere, a business unit of Forescout. He’s on the show to discuss why Forescout released 56 new OT vulnerabilities dubbed ICEFALL. He shares the design flaws that led to these vulnerabilities and more importantly, explains what needs to happen if compromised controllers or devices can’t be fixed. He also shares a startling stat about how many industrial customers are actually updating their devices after a vulnerability has been disclosed, and how to encourage more of them to address security flaws. If you want to learn more abut securing critical infrastructure, this is a good place to start.
Hosts: Stacey Higginbotham and Kevin Tofel
Guest: Daniel dos Santos, head of security research at Forescout
Sponsors: Nordic Semiconductor and Wirepas
- There are still more 2G and 3G IoT connections than 4G/5G ones
- With smart speakers it’s the same as it ever was
- Are the new Hue track lights for you?
- The ICEFALL vulnerabilities are a sign of progress actually.
- This vendor says only one in ten patch their OT gear
First, I congratulate Greg on knowing the difference between “occupancy sensor” (someone is in the room), “presence sensor” (Greg is in the room), “motion sensor” (something moved in the room) and PIR sensor (something warm just moved across the sensor’s detection field). Bravo!
While I agree with Kevin and Stacy that much better and more interesting occupancy sensors are likely to be available in about two years, there are some other options available now that might help depending on the exact use case. I’m going to limit this to discussion of options that would work with HomeKit, but there are additional devices for other platforms
1. PRESSURE MATS
If your goal is to know that someone is lying in bed, sitting on the couch, or sitting in a specific chair including an office chair, you can often do that very effectively with a pressure mat. There are a whole bunch of DIY project reports on making these smarter at places like Instructables, but the basic approach is always the same
A) purchase a pressure mat. These come in all different sizes, for a couple of bucks for one that can measure an ounce or two to $75 or so for one that knows when a car is parked on top of it. This is basically two pieces of rubber or fabric which close a circuit when they come together, and which are calibrated so that a specific weight will put enough pressure on the mat to make the two pieces contact each other.
You find these in all kinds of crazy places. At Maritime supplies where they are used as a “doorbell “for a houseboat. (When somebody steps on the mat, a circuit is completed, and a chime can sound). At medical supply houses where they are used for monitoring patients getting out of bed in the middle of the night. Robotics supply companies where they are used for fun projects like knowing when your drone has parked itself.
This part itself doesn’t have a radio inside it. It’s just the mat piece.
B) Now wire that pressure Mat to a smart open/close sensor so that when the pressure mat circuit closes, the smart sensor will report the change in state. The aqara sensors are popular for these because they’re cheap, but you can do it with most HomeKit compatible sensors, including Eve. ( in order to work with HomeKit, the aqara sensor also requires an Aqara hub.) The exact details will depend on the model sensor, but you should be able to find that information
Here’s just one example, but again, lots of people have done this with lots of different devices. It’s just a way of adding a radio notification to a pressure mat.
https://www.reddit.com/r/HomeKit/comments/kf31oj/meet_the_aqara_pressure_pad_diy_idea_stolen_from/
So if the purpose of your occupancy use case is to know that someone is sitting or lying still somewhere, a pressure mat can work well.
If you just want to buy one that works out of the box and not mess around with wiring and taking the sensor apart, you can use Withings Sleep mat, Connect it via IFTTT to trigger an inexpensive Meross smart plug, and use the Meross plug to bring the state change into HomeKit. That would cost a lot more, and it is cloud-dependent because of the IFTTT step, but it’s pretty easy to set up, and works well for a bed or a couch. Too big for a chair, though.
https://www.withings.com/us/en/sleep
2. THE FUTURE IS NOW: HIOME THERMAL SENSOR
There is an amazing thermal sensor available right now which does occupancy exactly the way most people thinking of home automation occupancy wish it would work. It’s almost instantaneous, it can tell when there are two people in a room and one leaves, it even works with HomeKit although uncertified. It’s just very very expensive from a very small company. People who have it seem to love it, but you are talking about a cost of $200 per doorway. Maybe $120 each if you do at least five rooms. Oh, and it’s plug in, not battery.
https://www.hiome.com/
It runs locally. I’m not 100% sure, but I think this would continue to work even if the company goes out of business, at least via HomeKit. I would check with them to be sure though.
I can’t afford this myself, but as a wheelchair user it is definitely on my “when I win the lottery “ wish list. The engineering on this thing is amazing.
So those are two “right now” possibilities, depending on the exact use case.
I know lots of people using some variation of a pressure mat, and if you go the DIY route it can be pretty inexpensive. You don’t have to carry anything with you, and it’s able to recognize true occupancy because it’s based on the physical weight of something in the room. A person sitting on a chair or lying on the bed, but maybe even a coffee cup sitting on a particular coaster.
I don’t personally know anyone using the hiome thermal sensor system, but all the hands on reviews have been good. It’s just very expensive.
A friend of mine says that for completeness I should mention the Aqara FP1 miliwave radar sensor, but he lives in Hong Kong, so while I suppose he’s right, I will say upfront that this thing is really hard to find in either the US or Europe.
Otherwise it ticks all the boxes. It works with HomeKit as long as you have an aqara hub that works with HomeKit. It’s well engineered and pretty inexpensive for a true occupancy sensor, around $65. It seems to be quite reliable and is well reviewed. It’s using that radar technology that Stacey mentioned, but it is in fact released to market now. So all of that is the good news.
https://everythingsmarthome.co.uk/this-new-sensor-is-a-game-changer-for-your-smart-home/
The bad news is that it is currently only officially released in China, which means you have to be using the Chinese aqara servers or it won’t show up in your app. And documentation and support are only available in Chinese.
It does occasionally show up on AliExpress, so there are some people in the US and Europe who have it, but it’s not easy to find.
I do personally use and like aqara devices, but I only use them on the US server, so it doesn’t look like I’ll be getting this one for a while. So I think of this more as a proof of concept that Stacey and Kevin are right: we should start seeing more radar based occupancy sensors within a year or two.
And one more from my friend in Hong Kong. The technology isn’t as cool as the aqara radar sensor, this one has been out for about four years, but it’s an interesting design and I do know a couple of people who have it.
The brand is Terncy. It was very briefly available in the US in 2019, but I think now you have to get it from a Chinese source like AliExpress. Pretty easy to find though.
Like a lot of these Zigbee devices, it only works with HomeKit if you also have their hub. Pretty inexpensive at about $30 for the sensor and about $60 for the hub. Features are limited when compared to aqara but reviews indicate it’s a decent reliable basic system.
Now for this specific device, the Terncy Awareness Sensor, PP01. It’s a hockey puck style battery powered multisensor that sticks on the wall. It has a light sensor, a temperature sensor, and a big button in the middle that you can push to trigger a HomeKit scene or automation.
What makes it interesting for occupancy is that it has not one but two separate PIR “motion“ sensors, one on each edge opposite each other. The idea is that this allows you to recognize movement to the right of the sensor versus movement to the left of the sensor. So if you had a long hallway, you could trigger lights to come on as someone walked towards the sensor and then go off again as they walked away from it.
Sure, that’s pretty standard for a radar sensor, but it hasn’t been possible to do with a regular PIR sensor. It’s the fact that there are two of them positioned in the way that they are that allows you to do this. They each have a fairly wide detection field, but the two detection fields do not overlap. Clever.
When you buy this from a Chinese source, both instructions and support will be only available in Chinese, but it seems to be a fairly straightforward device to set up and use in HomeKit. You get one device tile for each of the different sensors.
I feel like this device fits a very specific kind of use case. It’s not going to be better than any other PIR sensor at realizing that somebody is sitting quietly in a room, so unlike the pressure mat or the Hiome or the radar sensors, it’s not going to be directly helpful there.
But it is a relatively low cost device which will be able to distinguish between someone walking into a room and walking out of the room, and that does have some uses. It is going to get tripped up when there’s more than one person in the same room, though, so you would have to design your automations pretty carefully.
I can see it being really good for a transit area that people walk through, like coming in off the front porch or that long hallway. But I just worry that this is going to work much better for someone who lives alone, I can foresee a lot of problems once you start having multiple people walking around.
So, it exists. It has an interesting design that might work better than a standard PIR sensor for occupancy for some use cases. The price is among the lowest I’ve mentioned because it is using older technology. And it does work well with HomeKit.
Personally, I will wait for the Aqara radar sensor to become available in the US, or until I get enough money to get a HIOME system. But the Terncy could be useful for some people, so I agree it’s worth a mention.
Here’s a very detailed review from Homekitnews from about four years ago, and it doesn’t look like the device has changed in that time. The comments about it coming to Amazon happened, as I mentioned, in 2019, but the line is no longer available there. You’ll have to get it from AliExpress or another Chinese source if you’re interested.
https://homekitnews.com/2018/11/19/xiaoyan-awareness-switch-review2/
And here’s the manufacturer’s English language site
https://www.terncy.com/en-us/awarenessswitch/
(Oh, and as always, the default Apple home app doesn’t let you create automations based on light level, but you can through third-party apps like Home + 5 or the Eve app if you need that.)
One more option for the specific situation where you want to know the difference between someone walking towards the sensor and someone walking away…
Terncy is another inexpensive Chinese brand that makes zigbee devices that show up in HomeKit when connected to their own hub.
They have a very clever design for a wallmount battery powered multisensor. Model number PP01, called the “awareness sensor.” Hockey puck style, it has a PIR motion sensor on each edge opposite each other, plus a button in the middle that you can press to activate HomeKit scene. It also has an internal light and temperature sensor.
Each PIR sensor has a pretty wide detection field, but the two fields do not overlap. This makes it perfect for recognizing when someone is walking towards the sensor from the left versus walking away from it towards the right.
A lot of people are using it for long hallways. As the person walks towards the sensor mounted at the top of the stairs, you can have the stairway lights come on. Then when they are walking away from the sensor down the stairs, you can have the lights at the top of the staircase go off again and The lights at the bottom of the staircase come on.
Depending on the exact room set up, you might also be able to use this to recognize someone walking into a room versus walking out of it. I have a friend who lives by himself who has one of these set up to recognize when he is walking into his home office versus when he is walking out of it.
It was introduced in China back in around 2018, briefly sold in the US in 2019, but now is only sold in China. But you should be able to find the English language manual online if you need that.
These don’t have as many fancy features as aqara, but this particular design is clever and seems to work well for this purpose. And they are definitely budget priced, you can usually find the awareness sensor for around $30 on AliExpress. Remember you also need to get the Terncy hub if you don’t already have it.
It doesn’t do people counting, so it can get confused if there’s more than one person in a room. Or if two people walk towards it from opposite directions at the same time.
But if you live by yourself and have one of these specific types of use cases, it’s available now, works with HomeKit and is relatively inexpensive. So that will be another candidate for some people.
I think it’s especially well suited for that home office use case. You want some things to happen as you approach the room, like the lights inside the room to come on, but then you’ll probably be in the room for a while and you may be sitting at a desk and not moving. You don’t want anything to change during that time. Then when you leave the room again, you want the lights inside that room to turn off. The Terncy PP01 Awareness sensor can handle that really well with a very simple automation and only the one device. So this fits the criteria of being “more accurate than a typical motion sensor“ but only for this specific kind of situation where directionality makes a big difference.