In a digital city where all devices are connected to the network and where business process can be applied to those devices you have the possibility for many, many services. To access those services a consumer needs to expose their presence and their identity on the network.
Let’s assume everyone carries a device that has their digital identity – it might just be a mobile phone with their number as an ID or it could be a smart device with all their contact details, digital wallet, personal preferences and health history - a topic for another day.
To access services in an automated city you need to grant permission for certain devices to have access to certain levels of information. Based on current “permission” models it would seem to me that the logical way to provide access would be through a layered model with a series of groups such as the following:
- Your Personal Area Network (PAN), this is the group of devices you choose to trust. These devices are typically going to be in your home, your car and your office. You might let a few other devices in at your coffee stop, a friend’s house etc but it’s a very close group of devices (there might be hundreds of them though!)
- Then you need to define a set of device types (such as parking meters) or devices controlled by certain vendor types (such as restaurants) within a geography that are devices you are prepared to connect with under certain conditions – your near them, what you want to do requires their involvement.
- There would be groups of devices you would only receive from or only send to, again depending on conditions you define
- There would be devices you would bar
- The information exposed may be limited to your digital identity device being present through to contact details and all the way to personal preferences and historical information
- The Operator may make certain devices or device types and information mandatory
Some people – like those who expose to much of their personal life on Facebook won’t think twice about this. Others will be running to whatever privacy watchdog they can to complain about the city even tracking their phone – even though the telco already does this and even when the solution is to turn your phone off.
Tags: Connected Real Estate, devices, digital cities, internet of things, privacy
