The Internet of Things – Privacy and Security: does it have to be a trade-off?

Picture this: a fridge with a button that allows you to order take-away pizza and signals you when it’s time to buy groceries; a luggage that can communicate its geolocation and lock itself, if lost; a door bell that sends you video alerts when someone rings at your door; a thermostat that monitors your apartment’s temperature, and automatically adjusts it, in a cost-efficient way. You may start heating your car on a cold night before stepping in, and alert your friends when you have drunk way too much and need a drive back home, thanks to ice-cubes in your cocktail that will text your friends and change colour based on how much you have been drinking!

 

While all this may seem to some of you the setting for a movie showing a distant future – such as Minority Report – most of these Wi-Fi connected objects already exist and are available on the market.

A research by the International Data Corporation showed that 212 billion smart objects will be owned by the world population by 2020. Businesses are ready: Samsung recently bought Things, a company that develops platforms for smart homes; years ago Google acquired Flutter, a gesture recognition startup, Nest Labs for the development of smart meters, and the robotics expert Boston Dynamics. Apple has released a framework to create iOS apps that can communicate with connected accessories and with your home (HomeKit).

At the same time, the Data Gate is still fresh on Europeans’ minds, and hacking attacks on smart home accessories are already possible, potentially threatening malfunctions of life-saving objects, such as implantable cardiac defibrillators (ICDs). In 2014, a fridge in the US was infected by a virus and started sending spam to all the objects it was connected to. As we become increasingly reliant on this interconnection of things, problems may emerge with regards to security. The major issue is that for the moment products are still sold without a security vision, and purchasers fail to recognise the security aspect (for instance, they do not change the default passwords).

Now, imagine the Snowden scandal, and apply it to the amount and nature of the information that these apps can release: your energetic consumption, your food or music preferences, your daily habits and health.

The huge amount of data provided by your Wi-Fi connected smart home appliances may be used by external agencies for the most disparate purposes: business and marketing purposes, in the case of food, health; even insurance companies, who may monitor your eating or sports habits and use these as predictors of obesity or other health-related problems, with the goal of increasing premiums; security and investigation purposes, in the case of government departments. But most importantly, the Internet of Things (IoT) may help the life of cybercriminals, posing tremendous security threats, especially in public spaces. One further issue is linked to the concept of trust between citizens, businesses and policy makers.

One of the most recurrent themes since the times of pax romana emerges again: is there a necessary trade-off between liberty and security? Do citizens necessarily have to be less free in order to be secure, and vice versa? In other words, what is the relationship between privacy and security, and what are Europeans’ perceptions and requirements in 2015?

An easy answer is that specific rules and regulations for the IoT will need to be set up at an EU level, in order to clearly define a consistent and acceptable degree of intrusiveness that companies and governments may be allowed for, and to set security measures that protect individuals from malicious actions.

By Valentina Zuri

MY-WAY sets out to improve the web entrepreneurship ecosystem for students in Europe

As a coordinator of MY-WAY project I am happy to share with you our first article!

MY-WAY will integrate student networks into the web-entrepreneurship eco-system for supporting the next generation of tech-entrepreneurs. If you would like to know more about the project or join our community please visit our website or follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook or Twitter.

The article is available at http://www.eu-startups.com

 

Started on the 1st of January 2015, MY-WAY is a two-year project, which was co-funded under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme. The ambitious project aims to enhance and improve the collaboration and efforts of web entrepreneurship initiatives (startup hubs, accelerator networks, contests, etc.), Internet and business experts (accelerators, mentors, etc.), educational actors (business teachers and trainers) and the young adults as the final beneficiaries (through student networks, student entrepreneurship initiatives, etc.).

Krisztina Toth, the Technical Coordinator of the project, explains:

“The goal of MY-WAY is to strengthen the web entrepreneurship ecosystem and the services offered to young founders by different organizations by actively engaging student networks and student entrepreneurship centres”.

The MY-WAY project, in which we (EU-Startups.com) are one of the proud partners, will increase the visibility and impact of web entrepreneurship initiatives and services by actively engaging student networks and support centres, and connecting them with the best schemes within the startup ecosystem. Young adults across Europe will benefit from a wide variety of information, discovery of synergies and linkages between the educational actors, industry professionals and their services. The MY-WAY initiative will research the biggest challenges of students and graduates in regards to entrepreneurship and is going to represent the interests of the targeted young adults throughout all phases of the project.

As a first step, the MY-WAY consortium is currently conducting an online survey for students and graduates as well as face-to-face interviews with student support centres at universities. The goal here is to identify the needs and challenges of students and the support centres in regards to web entrepreneurship. During the two-year project, the following main results will be achieved:

• MY-WAY will map the web entrepreneurial ecosystem in Europe;
• Two stakeholder discussions will be organised in Brussels in October 2015 and January 2016;
• Four action plans will be developed in four countries/cities (Budapest, Zaragoza, London and Istanbul) for the sustainable enhancement and harmonisation of the support offered by the student enterprise centres and networks for targeted young adults;
• Three Student Enterprise Conferences will be organised in 2016;
• Signed agreements between student support centres and web entrepreneurship support providers in different European countries will strengthen sustainability;

MY-WAY will also support the Young European Disruptors’ Network (EDs) – a European community of entrepreneurs who will meet at summits, regional events, leadership development programmes and community-organized gatherings around Europe. EDs are encouraged to learn from each other, and with each other, in a search for innovative solutions to present-day problems. The main scope of the network is to catalyse the next generation of disruptors through personal experiences that enable EDs to build knowledge and reach a better understanding of European challenges and trends. MY-WAY will set up a virtual secretariat for the Young European Disruptors’ Network in order to share information on activities of the Startup Europe initiatives and projects, engage stakeholders and enhance the cooperation.

Under the same call in Horizon 2020, a total number of ten projects have received funding. Like MY-WAY and the Young European Disruptors’ Network, they will work together in order to support the implementation of the Startup Europe Initiative, which aims at boosting innovation, entrepreneurship and the growth of startups and thus injecting dynamism into the economy and society.

The MY-WAY consortium is composed of ten partners, from seven different countries, representing the main actors of the web entrepreneurship ecosystem. The project is coordinated by Europa Media Non-profit Ltd. (HU).

The project partners are: London Association of Enterprise Agencies Ltd. – Capital Enterprise (UK), H-Farm Italia (IT), AEGEE European Students’ Forum (BE), NACUE – National Association of College and University Entrepreneurs (UK), Bar-Ilan University (IL), Sabanci University (TR), EUCLID Network (UK), YES – European Confederation of Young Entrepreneurs (BE) and Menlo Media UG – EU-Startups.com (DE).

Let me end this first introduction of the MY-WAY project with a direct question to you, dear reader: What are, in your mind, the most important steps to improve the web entrepreneurship ecosystem for students in Europe? In other words, what should be done to enable more students and young adults in Europe to become web entrepreneurs?

For further information on the MY-WAY project visit the recently launched project website!

by: Kriszina Tóth

 

The end of the Circular Economy – but not for us

On 25^th February 2015, the College of Commissioners has adopted the executive’s 2015 Work Programme, permanently abolishing the Circular Economy Package.

This was a set of six bills on municipal waste, packaging waste, landfill, end of life vehicles, marine litter, among others. It was proposed last June, in the last stage of Barroso’s term, with the aim of increasing recycling levels and tightening rules on incineration and landfill. In particular, the Commission had stated it could create €600 billion net savings, two million jobs and deliver 1% GDP growth.

Since resource-efficiency was included as one of the seven flagship initiatives in the Europe 2020 Strategy for Sustainable and Inclusive Growth, several NGOs had held high expectations about the process leading the European Commission to such a measure.

The first proposal, issued by the Commission on 2^nd July 2014[1], contained a wide-ranging list of legally binding targets:

• A 70% recycling target for municipal waste by 2030;
• An 80% recycling target for packaging by 2030;
• A ban on landfilling of all recyclable and biodegradable waste by 2025.

Further goals were defined as merely “aspirational”, thus not legally enforceable:

• A phase out of landfilling of all recoverable waste by 2030;
• A 30% reduction of waste by 2025;
• A 30% fall in marine litter by 2020.

Since its approval, however, the package has been the target of harsh criticisms, particularly by BusinessEurope, the EU employers’ organisation, representing European companies. This organisation rejected the idea of having legally binding targets at all, and further argued that the established figures would be nearly impossible to achieve, given the current status of European waste management.

Due to the change of leadership at the Commission, the proposal was temporarily shelved. The new President of the Commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, came to power on 1^st November 2014, and gave his First Vice President Frans Timmermans the task of discussing with the European Parliament and the Council, within the first three months of the mandate, the list of pending proposals from Barroso’s mandate (about 130 pieces of legislation) and see whether it was still advisable to pursue them. The list of legislations to be ditched was leaked one week before the official announcement, and the Circular Economy package appeared in the list.

 

BusinessEurope restarted pushing the Commission to withdraw the Circular Economy package, arguing that such issues should be regulated under an economic piece of legislation, rather than taking purely an environmental perspective[2]. In particular, BusinessEurope representatives voiced concerns over the binding nature of certain rules.

The debate became heated, with 20 non-profit groups and organisations signing a letter with a point-by-point rebuttal of the BusinessEurope statement, advocating against the “narrow assertion” that business competitiveness would be hampered by the package, stating “We believe, as do a vast number of progressive companies, that the only way for European industry to be competitive is to innovate with the limits of a low carbon and resource efficient economy, and to embrace strong social, labour, consumer and environmental protection measures”.

This was followed by further protest actions by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, eleven national environmental ministers. Despite all these, and further concerns by European Parliament President Martin Schulz and a letter signed by ten countries[3], on 16^th December 2014 Timmermans announced MEPs that the Circular Economy package would be ditched, to be replaced with more ambitious legislation in 2015. According to EurActive, one MEP even shouted “shame” at Timmermans when he confirmed the decision. Timmermans replied the new proposal would come in 2015. “We will do this very quickly because we want the Circular Economy … we want to put something on the table that is more ambitious”[4].

As underlined by Italy’s Environment Minister Gianluca Galletti, this decision is completely at odds with the EU’s position at the UN: Galletti had just returned from the Lima Climate Change Conference, in which some progress was made towards a new global Climate Action. At the end of 2015, leaders will gather in Paris to find a final agreement: the withdrawal of this package is thus seen as an obstacle on the road to Paris.

In mid-January, the European Parliament tried once last time to save the Circular Economy package, through a series of resolutions. However, MEPs were not able to find a political agreement and ended up backing individual resolutions, all aiming at saving individual environmental bills, and thus failing to secure a majority. True, this failure does not mean a backing of the Commission’s decision, but it is still a sign of weakness and lack of ability to join forces for a common goal.

In the meantime, environmental advocates have grown suspicious on the matter, pointing the finger at BusinessEurope’s role in shaping Timmermans’s decision and demanding the Commission to provide analyses that prove how the Circular Economy package was doomed to fail. No such evidence has been released yet, despite the reliance on official channels to ask for the disclosure: namely the EU’s Access to Documents regulation, which sets a 30-day deadline for the Commission’s response, and the transparency obligations under the Aarhus Convention.

While we were waiting for the reports to be disclosed, the Commission’s 2015 Work Programme was approved, and a formal decision was made to withdraw the Circular Economy package, along with 72 further laws among those under Timmermans’s scrutiny. Allegedly, an improved version of the package will be resubmitted “later this year”.

This is a great disappointment for all those organisations that are actively investing to achieve a “zero waste” economy. Geonardo is also doing its best to keep the Circular Economy well and alive. We are currently partner in the FP7 project “PlasCarb – Turning waste into a resource through innovative technologies, processes and services”, coordinated by the Centre for Process Innovation. We remain firmly convinced of the necessity of a change from a linear model of “take-make-consume-dispose”, to a real circular approach, where resources are reutilized more times, and the amount of waste is minimized. PlasCarb is aiming exactly at creating a new technology that will allow value to be recovered from waste food. We are now sending out the project’s first newsletter: subscribe on our website to learn more about the project and have further information on these issues, or click here to view it online.

 

Fortunately, Horizon 2020 can help supporting European organisations and companies committed to the concept of Circular Economy[5], and hopefully it will continue to do so in the future.

[1] http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/ALL/?uri=CELEX:52014DC0398

[2] http://www.euractiv.com/sections/social-europe-jobs/gender-equality-and-environment-laws-business-lobby-hit-list-310236

[3] Belgium, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden.

[4] http://www.euractiv.com/sections/sustainable-dev/circular-economy-package-be-ditched-and-re-tabled-310866

[5] Read the Annex to the Circular Economy Package: “How can Horizon 2020 contribute to the Circular Economy?” http://eur-lex.europa.eu/resource.html?uri=cellar:50edd1fd-01ec-11e4-831f-01aa75ed71a1.0001.01/DOC_2&format=PDF