Industry 4.0 is on the way to becoming a fancy buzzword, as this project of the German government is believed to increasingly enable the computerization of traditional industries. Mobile devices are being used frequently to control production equipment in the smart factory, which focuses on adaptability, resource efficiency and the integration of suppliers and manufacturers in different processes. The basis is the so-called internet of things. The term Industry 4.0 was first used at the Hanover Fair in 2011. A year later, the Working Group on Industry 4.0, chaired by Siegfried Dais (Robert Bosch GmbH) and Henning Kagermann (SAP’s Co-founder), presented recommendations to the government. And another year later the final report was ready. Industry 4.0 or the “fourth industrial revolution” is believed to be a reality within 10 to 20 years. Meanwhile, in the US an initiative known as the Smart Manufacturing Leadership Coalition has also been working on the same issue to enable the industry to form collaborative R&D, advocacy groups for development of methods, standards, platforms and shared infrastructure for the adoption of manufacturing intelligence. Similarly, General Electric has been working on the Industrial Internet.
However, we hear about organizations spying on their neighbors. And — what a surprise —they are using every opportunity and capability for this. Now it’s up to you and me to wonder what is going to happen with all these interconnected systems? They are probably an easy target for unwelcome interception. Even if only a small proportion of the interconnected devices are used in industrial systems, there is still a huge opportuity to spy on in order to gather information on intellectual property, covert industrial methods and other secrets that can be used in worldwide competition. Jacob Appelbaum, a friend of Edward Snowden, suggests that Europeans build solutions on free hard and software designed, maintained and verified in Europe. As these systems — in contrast to proprietary solutions, which don’t reveal their core technology and their hidden backdoors — are open and easy to understand for experts. Off-shore solutions which are opaque cannot be really conceived and controlled in detail. And as such they are precarious and risky. Even if we are not plagued by paranoia we should listen to Jacob Appelbaum.
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