2022-04-10
A friend of mine bought a laundry machine with a tumble dry function recently. It has several different programs and even admits a cheerful melody after it's done.
And it has a WiFi network chip. Because... reasons? I have a dishwasher, a laundry machine, a tumble drier, a toaster, and more. None of them have ever had the ability to connect to the internet. Nor have I ever found a need for them to be. I mean, they do their respective jobs already.
Internet of Things is a big trend these days, and there is no end to the problems it's caused for users of these items. From TVs deciding to take their time to update in the middle of Super Bowl to ovens being bricked because a server went offline.
99% of these things have one thing in common: they don't actually need an internet connection to do their job. Most of the updates they need are security patches, which are often not applied to the extent needed.
I told my friend to not ever let their laundry machine connect to the internet.
-- CC0 Björn Wärmedal