IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine

This article is a single-source introduction to the emerging concept of smart cities. It can be used for familiarizing researchers with the vast scope of research possible in this application domain. The smart city is primarily a concept, and there is still not a clear and consistent definition among practitioners and academia. As a simplistic explanation, a smart city is a place where traditional... View full abstract»

In 2008, the emergence of the blockchain as the foundation of the first-ever decentralized cryptocurrency not only revolutionized the financial industry but proved a boon for peer-to-peer (P2P) information exchange in the most secure, efficient, and transparent manner. The blockchain is a public ledger that works like a log by keeping a record of all transactions in chronological order, secured by... View full abstract»

A current challenge in the development of autonomous vehicles is programming the ethics of their behavior. One way to explore ethical issues of safety and agency when an autonomous vehicle is put in a situation where it must choose between two outcomes has been to use the trolley problem, a moral dilemma documented by Prof. J.J. Thompson of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology [1]. In the tro... View full abstract»

In the last few years, we have witnessed an exponential growth in research activity into the advanced training of convolutional neural networks (CNNs), a field that has become known as deep learning. This has been triggered by a combination of the availability of significantly larger data sets, thanks in part to a corresponding growth in big data, and the arrival of new graphics-processing-unit (G... View full abstract»

Current activities in the Internet of Things (IoT) are focused on architectures, protocols, and networking for the efficient interconnection of heterogeneous things, infrastructure deployment, and creation of value-added services. The majority of the IoT products, services, and platforms are supported by cloud-computing platforms. With the IoT being a multidisciplinary ecosystem, it is now being u... View full abstract»

The blockchain is emerging as one of the most propitious and ingenious technologies of cybersecurity. In its germinal state, the technology has successfully replaced economic transaction systems in various organizations and has the potential to revamp heterogeneous business models in different industries. Although it promises a secure distributed framework to facilitate sharing, exchanging, and th... View full abstract»

In this article, we provided a tutorial on MEC technology and an overview of the MEC framework and architecture recently defined by the ETSI MEC ISG standardization group. We described some examples of MEC deployment, with special reference to IoT uses since the IoT is recognized as a main driver for 5G. After having also discussed benefits and challenges for MEC toward 5G, we can say that MEC has... View full abstract»

Blockchains and sensors installed on a vehicle could be combined to semiautomatically activate/deactivate car insurance coverage in an envisaged on-demand insurance scenario. We present a prototype that includes a mobile application (app) and a portable electronic device to be installed onboard. The mobile app lets the driver dynamically change the status of specific insurance coverage (in some ca... View full abstract»

Bitcoin, the first cryptocurrency, has the ability to transmit and verify digital assets on the Internet without specific management entities. There are currently more than 1,500 cryptocurrencies with a market capitalization of more than US$480 billion. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies were built on blockchain technologies to prevent forgery and falsification while distributing transaction data ... View full abstract»

The recent trend of edge computing extends cloud computing and the Internet of Things (IoT) to the edge of the network. Similar to most systems, an intrusion-detection system (IDS) is commonly used to mitigate cybersecurity threats in edge computing. Due to the limitations in edge nodes (e.g., in terms of computational and storage capabilities), efficient and fair resource allocation within an IDS... View full abstract»

The Internet-of-Things (IoT) has taken over the business spectrum, and its applications vary widely from agriculture and health care to transportation. A hospital environment can be very stressful, especially for senior citizens and children. With the ever-increasing world population, the conventional patient-doctor appointment has lost its effectiveness. Hence, smart health care becomes very impo... View full abstract»

The flow of data traffic has been vastly increased because of the implementation of the Internet of Things (IoT)-and security is a top need for Internet communication. The encryption-decryption process ensures that data access is restricted to legitimate users. But there is a tradeoff between the level of security and the communication overhead. View full abstract»

The Consumer Technology Association (CTA) counts among its members companies that are integral to all parts of the automotive supply chain: from chip companies, including Intel and Nvidia, to tier 1 subsystem suppliers, such as Visteon and Mobileye, to car manufacturers, including Ford, General Motors, Nissan, and Toyota. The aftermarket suppliers, such as Sony, Kenwood, Pioneer, Alpine, and Voxx,... View full abstract»

In 2016, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued new guidelines regarding the use and prescription of opioids for the treatment of chronic pain [1]. Today, "the CDC recommends that opioids should not be the first line or only treatment for patients who present with chronic noncancer pain" [2]. Additionally, the National Institute on Drug Abuse suggests that cognitive-behav... View full abstract»

A health-care system gathers comprehensive physiological information and medical records, making its data more important than ever. For example, for years now, the National Health Insurance Administration (https://www.nhi.gov.tw/English/) of Taiwan has requested every doctor, whether in a medical center or private clinic, to upload the diagnosis result, treatment, and prescription. These anamneses... View full abstract»

The first wearables DevCon for developers of wearables was held in San Francisco 5-7 March 2014 and was greeted with great enthusiasm, with more than 1,000 people attending the three-day event. With the introduction of Google Glass, Epson Moverio, Pebble, and Fitbit, wearables have certainly captured the attention of many consumers and enterprises. While some of these wearables mainly provide a si... View full abstract»

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a network of physical things, objects, or devices, such as radio-frequency identification tags, sensors, actuators, mobile phones, and laptops. The IoT enables objects to be sensed and controlled remotely across existing network infrastructure, including the Internet, thereby creating opportunities for more direct integration of the physical world into the cyber wor... View full abstract»

Advanced driver-assistance systems (ADASs) have become a salient feature for safety in modern vehicles. They are also a key underlying technology in emerging autonomous vehicles. State-of-the-art ADASs are primarily vision based, but light detection and ranging (lidar), radio detection and ranging (radar), and other advanced-sensing technologies are also becoming popular. In this article, we prese... View full abstract»

We live in the age of After Google (AG), where information is just one click away and talking just one touch away. The near future of the AG age is the Internet of Things (IoT), where physical things connected over a network will take part in Internet activities to exchange information about themselves and their surroundings. In other words, the IoT is nothing but a computing concept in which ever... View full abstract»

Substantial ongoing research now uses smartphones as a research platform for various studies and interventions. With the aging population becoming a frequent focus of research, an increasing number of studies and projects attempt to develop technological interventions for the elderly population. The extent to which the elderly population (i.e., seniors) adopts and uses smartphones is not clear. Ma... View full abstract»

In the continuous evolution of the computer age, the next big step in security is being achieved by embracing quantum cryptography. As the unit of information shifts from the currently used bit to the quantum bit (qubit), a new realm of untapped features is offered that can be used to ensure the confidentiality of the information being shared among participants. This system confidentiality is ensu... View full abstract»

Consumer electronics (CE) based on the Internet of Things (IoT) are playing a key role in boosting the global economy by improving quality of life and creating new markets, products, and research paradigms. This special issue provides a publication medium for articles that either review existing IoT-based CE devices, systems, and platforms or explore novel research paradigms such as smart homes an... View full abstract»

As a popular conception, the Internet of Things (IoT) allows people to access more and more data around the world. However, a concern arises of how to store the large amount of data created through this technology. To solve the problem, cloud computing services are brought in as a critical technology. However, it is necessary to guard the private information that is collected via IoT devices and s... View full abstract»

A Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) is a distributed set of sensors deployed to work together for collective sensing and possible data processing. A WSN can be used to monitor environmental behavior and structural integrity in a variety of application fields, thus becoming an integral part of the consumer electronics of smart buildings in smart cities. Due to ever-increasing population growth, along w... View full abstract»

As we become more aware of the connection between emotional states and physical health, affective computing continues to rise as a field of interest. Affective computing uses both hardware and software technology to detect the affective state of a person. It is an active research area that has seen much growth in technology geared toward affective state analysis. Its origin is credited to Dr. Rosa... View full abstract»

The winds of change are blowing toward the multibillion dollar global consumer electronics (CE) industry, which includes companies that are engaged in the manufacturing of smart devices to enable smartconnected vehicles, transportation, health-care systems, home automation, and smart industry in the smart-city network. The rapid increase in the number and diversity of smart devices connected to th... View full abstract»

Advancement in payment technologies has an important impact on one's quality of life. Emerging payment technologies create both opportunities and challenges for the future. Being a quick and convenient process, contactless payment gained momentum, especially with merchants, with throughput being the main parameter. However, it poses risks to issuers, as no robust customer verification method is av... View full abstract»

This is the first installment of the new "Security and Privacy Matters" column in IEEE Consumer Electronics Magazine. Security and privacy are always at the heart of everything that happens in the Consumer Electronics (CE) industry. This column aims to provide insight on various aspects of security and privacy in the CE industry. View full abstract»

Demands from the commerce, finance, security, and logistics sectors drive the persistent growth of computing. As current research focuses on providing new computing capabilities using disruptive approaches, quantum computing represents a promising strategy that offers new capabilities in secure computation, trusted data storage, and efficient applications. This article discusses the growing awaren... View full abstract»

The summer and fall of 2016 were stirring times in the mobile phone market. Samsung's long-awaited Galaxy Note 7, called by some a "phablet" because of its larger size and expanded capabilities that compare with some tablet devices, was launched in many markets in August 2016. It was thought by many to be a serious threat to Apple, who launched its iPhone 7 a month later in hopes of reviving its f... View full abstract»

Smart tourism is an important component of smart cities. However, in many cities, insecurity, safety, fraud, and the lack of availability of proper information about resources are the biggest hurdles toward independent mobility. These issues can be overcome via proactive participation of local citizens to help tourists as well as by cooperation between citizens, city administration, and tourists. ... View full abstract»

Advanced driver assistance systems (ADASs) are accelerating the growth of infrared (IR) devices used in automotive applications. Some of these are well-known applications, such as ambient light sensing, steering wheel sensors, and rain sensors. However, many new technologies for ADASs, such as LIDAR, driver monitoring, adaptive beam, and matrix lighting, are still in the early evolution phase of t... View full abstract»

Virtual reality (vr) will be a profoundly disruptive technology in the same way as the smartphone and the Internet. Like the smartphone, VR uses a new interface format (a head-mounted display and hand controllers) to provide much more intuitive and natural access to a computing device. Much like the Internet, it allows a new kind of worldwide communication-but this time with a natural human experi... View full abstract»

Cognitive consumer electronics (CE), the fastest-growing sector worldwide that is driven by machine intelligence and cognitive systems, is triggered and enabled by audio- and video-capturing devices, smart sensors, health- and fitness-monitoring devices, security and education electronics, and intelligent systems. Smart consumer sensors and cognitive systems are synergized through the Internet of ... View full abstract»

The evidence that climate change is real and most likely caused by human-related activities has made the international community consider a new energy model. Europe has led the initiative, moving away from fossil fuels toward renewable energies, while powerful countries such as the United States and China are lagging behind and still rely heavily on coal, gas, and oil as energy sources. Europe has... View full abstract»

Today's proliferation of smart systems, devices, and things causes some severe side effects. The use cases of "smart" anything, although numerous, are often made very complex due to the abundance of devices required to enable those use cases. This causes a variety of human-machine interfaces (HMIs), which are by no means standardized, making the public adoption of consumer technology much harder t... View full abstract»

The term internet of things (IoT) is often defined in a variety of different ways but typically refers to electronic devices and systems (e.g., toaster ovens and wearable sensors) with added computational capabilities and Internet connectivity. The IoT introduces new security concerns that must be addressed at an early stage of the IoT design. Since security operations such as encryption and authe... View full abstract»

Although the concepts of virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) were invented decades ago (if not centuries ago, in a broader sense), the technologies enabling VR and AR just collectively met a critical point in recent years as people started enjoying the experience rather than merely tolerating it, as they did in the early days. From this point, more and more people believe that VR and A... View full abstract»

Future 5G cellular networks are expected to play a major role in supporting the Internet of Things (IoT) due to their ubiquitous coverage, plug-and-play configuration, and embedded security. Besides connectivity, however, the IoT will need computation and storage in proximity of sensors and actuators to support timecritical and opportunistic applications. Mobile-edge computing (MEC) is currently u... View full abstract»

Modern sensing devices play a pivotal role in achieving data acquisition, communication, and dissemination for the Internet of Things (IoT). Naturally, IoT applications and intelligent sensing systems supported by sensing devices, such as wireless sensor networks (WSNs), are closely coupled. Modern intelligent sensing systems generate huge volumes of sensing data, well beyond the processing capabi... View full abstract»

The IEEE P2048 Working Group is developing 12 standards for virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Having attracted participants from over 200 companies and institutions all over the world, the working group is one of the largest forces dedicated to VR/AR standardization. Its participants already include device manufacturers, content providers, service providers, technology developers, g... View full abstract»

The Internet of Things (IoT) is focused on architectures and protocols for the efficient interconnection of heterogeneous things, deployment of infrastructure, and creation of value-added services. The IoT has become an emerging technology, where more than 50 billion things will be connected to the Internet by 2020, and data in the network will grow by another 1,000 times. The framework of the IoT... View full abstract»

Increasing health awareness and rapid technological advancements have resulted in significant growth in an emerging sector: smart health care. By the end of 2020, the total number of smart health-care devices is expected to reach 808.9 million (646 million devices without wearables and the remaining with wearables) [1], [2]. This proliferation of devices is expected to revolutionize health care by... View full abstract»

Due to the wide variety of devices used in computer network systems, cybersecurity plays a major role in securing and improving the performance of the network or system. Although cybersecurity has received a large amount of global interest in recent years, it remains an open research space. Current security solutions in network-based cyberspace provide an open door to attackers by communicating fi... View full abstract»

This article critically analyzes the trends and limits of integrated technologies for sensing, computing, and data storage when devices and systems originally developed for consumer electronics (CE) are used for self-driving cars. Some hints, supported by theoretical analysis and experimental work, are provided to overcome the issues of inertial sensors, micromirrors for lidar scanners, car data/p... View full abstract»

New technologies in the field of neuroprosthetics and robotics are leading to the development of innovative commercial products based on user-centered, functional processes of cognitive neuroscience and perceptron studies. The aim of this review is to analyze this innovative path through the description of some of the latest neuroprosthetics and human-robot interaction applications, in particular ... View full abstract»

The smart city has become a new trend of interest with recent developments in information and communications technology (ICT) and the Internet of Things (IoT). These technologies provide users with new ways to interact with smart cities, especially city data. Visualizing data is crucial for improving a city's planning and management. Currently, most cases of city data visualization are mainly impl... View full abstract»

Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) are becoming increasingly ubiquitous. They can be found in illumination appliances, phones, TVs, advertising panels, dashboards, and traffic signals, among others. Most illumination applications are becoming LED based, mainly due to their long operational lifetime and high energy efficiency, which is nowadays higher than 100 lm/W. Other benefits include enhanced sustai... View full abstract»

With the dawning of the 21st century, the demand for energy continues to rise. The building sector has emerged as a major energy consumer, prompting energy engineers to devise techniques for enhancing energy efficiency and conservation in this sector. Accordingly, the term energy-efficient buildings, which refers to the use of renewable energy sources (RESs) for generating power, is beginning to d... View full abstract»

During the last Mobile World Congress-the biggest technology conference in the world-the Internet of Things (IoT) was one of the most talked about topics, neck and neck with wireless networks and spectrum. IoT technologies can help cities to manage their resources better, monitor smart grids, deploy services as needed, and respond to emergencies in a more timely and efficient manner. With more cit... View full abstract»