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Why doesn't everything like that (affecting operation of the google appliance) require a preshared secret that's negotiated once per remote device via: - press

Why doesn't everything like that (affecting operation of the google appliance) require a preshared secret that's negotiated once per remote device via: - pressing a button or some other physical presence confirmation on the google device when a remote network device tries to gain credentials (Best!) - NFC (good because of range limitations, but annoying because of range limitations) - some kind of audio handshake (hackable from longer distances maybe extending beyond property boundaries, but so is bluetooth, and maybe with multiple mics a device could detect a higher-powered long-range hack attempt and filter it?) This might be the best option other than a physical button-press. If the confirmation signal is to hit the mic gently, can you even mimic that remotely through glass or a wall without doing something that would possibly deafen any bystanders? Seems a reasonable good compromise between ease of use and range limitation. - bluetooth, especially if power can be programmatically decreased to limit range to short-distance line-of-sight (obviously the normal bt range is a problem, but it's better than nothing) This is a solved problem, is it not? You only have to do that once, per remote device that needs to use the API. What's the problem with requiring a physical button press to trust a new device that's attempting to do something?

mrep 8y ago
All those would have limitations due to inter-vendor incompatibility. I think we need someone to develop a home IOT security standard protocol for how to handle this.
- harshreality 8y ago
  The app is specifically aware of the IOT device's API in order to use it at all. Why wouldn't it be aware of the IOT device's method for presence + intention verification? I left out another option for adding additional authorizations (beyond the initial setup), which should work for "important" IOT devices, like google home or amazon echo, that are already associated with an account someone is using and monitoring: - Send a confirmation prompt to the primary Google/Amazon account holder: "Do the "do you authorize <device>/<app> to access the API on your Google/Amazon X device?" Standardization would be great, but implementing one or two more API calls to deal with first-use verification of a remote app doesn't seem like a big deal when the app is going to be doing lots of other stuff with that specific device's API.

mrep 8y ago

All those would have limitations due to inter-vendor incompatibility. I think we need someone to develop a home IOT security standard protocol for how to handle this.

harshreality 8y ago
The app is specifically aware of the IOT device's API in order to use it at all. Why wouldn't it be aware of the IOT device's method for presence + intention verification? I left out another option for adding additional authorizations (beyond the initial setup), which should work for "important" IOT devices, like google home or amazon echo, that are already associated with an account someone is using and monitoring: - Send a confirmation prompt to the primary Google/Amazon account holder: "Do the "do you authorize <device>/<app> to access the API on your Google/Amazon X device?" Standardization would be great, but implementing one or two more API calls to deal with first-use verification of a remote app doesn't seem like a big deal when the app is going to be doing lots of other stuff with that specific device's API.