Smart air fryers ordered to stop invading our digital privacy

In a confirmation that we’ve gone full Black Mirror, the UK’s privacy czar has wagged a finger at air fryer manufacturers and told them to stop playing with our data.

New draft guidance from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) targets not just air fryer vendors but manufacturers of any smart home products, ranging from smart lighting systems through to internet-connected refrigerators and connected toys.

Collectively known as IoT (Internet of Things) devices, these connected objects have a nasty habit of collecting our data without us really understanding what they’re doing. This has been a concern with many of them, but late last year Which? magazine added air fryers to the list of offenders.

The guidance highlights the type of data that IoT vendors might collect. This includes registration data such as an owner’s name, address, and email. It also means information gathered directly from the product, revealing how the user interacts with it. A device might simply report to its manufacturer the times and duration of usage, while embedded sensors might monitor anything from temperature to motion.

To read the complete article, see: Smart air fryers ordered to stop invading our digital privacy.