The spirit of Edward Snowden lingered over this year's CeBIT tech fair. While the NSA whistle-blower warned of the consequences of digital spying via video link in Texas, exhibitors in Hanover grappled with the practical realities of doing digital business in a post-Snowden world.
This year CeBIT dropped its consumer component to focus squarely on business users with the buzzword being “datability”: how can companies mine huge data being generated every second – tapping sources ranging from global trade to social media – in a responsible and sustainable way?
From the outset of the event, it was clear Snowden’s revelations had darkened the heretofore silver-lining on cloud services, allowing remote data storage for universal access and collaboration. Concerns over data control, surveillance and theft are now to the fore, prompting CeBIT exhibitors to flash their privacy credentials in the hope that big data and big brother can be big business.
Fair organisers estimate the global market for mobile security alone, worth half a billion euro in 2013, will double in size by next year.
Given spying revelations surrounding GCHQ, the choice of Britain as CeBIT’s partner country raised more than a few eyebrows. British prime minister David Cameron’s opening speech, making no reference to spying, raised even more.
Instead he announced a new partnership between German and British universities on the next, fifth, generation of high-speed mobile internet capable of reducing movie download times from 40 to just one second.
"We are on the brink of a new industrial revolution and I want us, the UK and Germany, to lead it," he said.
Mr Cameron also announced €88 million in funding to boost research in the so-called Internet of Things. A slippery concept at the best of times, CeBIT demonstrated how this endless mine of internet data could be by fitting out an entire hall with a panorama membrane 12 metres high and 250 metres long. Onto this, designers Clemens Weisshaar and Reed Kram projected big data available to date – like the frequency of words in books published since 1800 – in multicoloured graphics.
Already endless, the big data mine is poised to expand even further when tractors and refrigerators start adding to the data pile – raising pressing questions about who owns, and profits from, the data.
Russian security expert Eugene Kaspersky warned that the rapid growth of the internet and big data meant governments and companies were playing catch-up with cyber criminals who operated globally by exploiting gaps in the patchwork of national legislation and standards.
“Just like other areas of infrastructure, such as power grids, IT systems should be subject to standards, with engineers penalised if they aren’t adhered to,” he said.
Asked whether he feared cyber criminals or the NSA more, the cybersecurity guru just snorted.
“I’m paranoid but optimistic, we are in danger but we will survive,” he said.
Perhaps it was the home advantage, or concern about NSA-spying on chancellor Angela Merkel’s mobile phone, but German CeBIT exhibitors appeared particularly determined to position themselves as global leaders in privacy technology. Many zeroed in on technologies bridging the previously irreconcilable divide between demands for greater data encryption, voiced by tech wizards like Edward Snowden, and the cost and convenience expectations of companies and users.
Fraunhofer, the brains behind the MP3 file and other technical innovations, are going live this autumn with “Omnicloud” software showing that convenience and confidentiality need not be contradictory.
Once installed on a company’s intranet, Omnicloud works seamlessly to encrypt all data – from file content and file names to file directory structure – with individual keys before saving them to external cloud drives. Administrators can decide whether to use one cloud, several in parallel or split data between various services.
The software uses standard protocols and can even act as an adapter to make older software cloud-ready. It also prevents cloud lock-in by allowing easy, encrypted migration from one cloud service to another.
Fraunhofer hopes Omnicloud will appeal to small and medium-sized companies anxious to take advantage of cloud computing but without the corporate budget to manage their own secure service.
“Until now cloud computing was too dangerous for many companies, not because of secret services but industrial espionage,” said Ruben Wolf, an Omnicloud researcher. “Our solution offers the combination of the flexibility of the cloud with the security businesses need.”
In CeBIT’s buzzing open source hall, there was a sense among exhibitors that NSA revelations could finally give open source the shot in the arm to crack the mass market.
"Having no access to the source code of proprietary software you cannot be sure there isn't a back door for the NSA to get to your data," said Michael Adam of Germany's Sernet, a leading developer in Samba. This open-source software suite allows companies shift their network from Microsoft active directory software to an open source standard – while retaining Windows at desktop level.
"We are confident," said Mr Adam, "that opening code open to full scrutiny offers less chance for secret services to exploit it."
From citizen journalist to planet paparazzi
For many journalists at this year's CeBIT, a eureka moment was encountering sell-news.com. Crossing "Storyful" with "eBay", this new German platform turns every smartphone owner into a citizen journalist. If you witness some news, upload your images or video to "Sellnews.com" where media organisations can start a bidding war for your exclusive content.
The smartphone app works two ways: using push notifications and GPS positioning, media organisations can let users in a specific area know that they are prepared to pay for digital content.
Sell-news.com is the brainchild of ex-TV journalist Slawomir Rybarczyk who was frustrated by his inability to source images of a soccer team’s away match while working on a German TV station. Realising there was no service to directly link media organisations and potential content producers, he set up his own. For a 25 per cent cut of the sell fee, Mr Rybarczyk hopes to end newsroom trawls of the internet for elusive images.
And what of the legal ramifications? Will sell-news.com create a paparazzi planet, or will it be abused and discredited first as a propaganda platform? Rybarczk admits that, as elsewhere, the "buyer beware" principle applies on his service - though he hopes to avoid a credibility crash with a verified user system.
sell-news.com
Great gas: Archos smartphones
CeBIT's shift away from consumer electronics spared several cows' worth of shoe leather, not to mention joyless hours comparing look-alike flatscreen TVs and soundalike stereo systems.
But that didn’t stop French electronics company Archos slipping in slinky new smartphones at the Hanover show, devices that mark an impressive intersection of tech goodies and price.
Raiding the periodic table for its model names, the Archos entry model at just €130 contract-free was the Titanium 40b. With front-mounted speakers and a dual SIM feature, it will appeal to teens and with a dual-core 1.3GHz processor, 512MB RAM alongside 1GB internal storage Android 4.2.2 Jelly Bean.
A definite spec improvement is the Helium in 4.5 and 5 inch display models, costing €199 and €249 respectively with quad-core CPU clocking 1.4GHz. Each phone packs 1GB of RAM, with the smaller Helium adding 4GB of internal storage and the larger doubling that. The larger Helium has the edge with a crisp HD display but both phones are sleek and thin.
Attracting the most covetous gazes, and still costing just €230, was the Archos Oxygen 50c. From next month, this skinny Archos number offers a MediaTek 1.7GHz octa-core processor behind a 5-inch LCD HD display.
Like its gaseous cousins, it offers dual SIM, 1GB RAM, 8GB of onboard storage and a microSD expansion.
German Tinkerbots: Taking aim at the toy market in 2014
Take Lego building blocks, cross it with Meccano, add some digital pixie dust and you have Tinkerbots. Winner of the 2014 CeBIT Innovation award, Tinkerbots gives a "Terminator" twist to a playroom favourite. The new German toy introduces children to mechanics through a modular system of components, from regular "cubie" building blocks to pivots and a "power brain" that allows programmed movement. All components are interconnectable, allowing an electric current to be transferred from one end of the toy to the other. The sets are expandable with additional blocks, sensors, moving parts and mini solar panels.
On display in CeBIT: a frisky dog, a snake and a fully-functional miniature crane – controllable via a smartphone.
Tinkerbots were invented in 2009 by Leonhard Oschütz, a graduate of the Bauhaus University Weimar. With his company, Kinematics, he hopes to tap the construction set toy market that is growing by 20 per cent annually.
“Beyond a toy we see many industry usages, for instance in areas where a robot is needed but doesn’t yet exist,” said Dr Matthias Burger, Kinematics director. “With our system you can build the robot that meets your needs, without the cost. It’s a simple product with unlimited possibilities.”
Via crowd-funding on indiegogo.com, the company hopes to have the first “Tinkerbots” sets in customer hands by Christmas. After that, it is hunting for international partners to take their 21st century toy global.
www.kinematicblocks.de
