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After years of research, learning, and development, Ikea says it’s ready to release a line of products it hopes will change the smart home game. The Swedish furniture manufacturer and retailer announced Wednesday that it will release 20 smart home products in January 2026 that it calls its “biggest step” yet to make smart home technology open, simple, and affordable. Ikea has released smart light bulbs and systems before, and previously partnered with Sonos for speakers, but this relaunched smart home line was designed to be universal. [Photo: Ikea] “Our goal is to make the smart home easy to use, easy to understand, and within reach for the many,” Ikea of Sweden’s range manager David Granath said in a statement. The heart of Ikea’s smart home system will be Dirigera, a hub that’s compatible with the smart home technical standard Matter. That means Ikea’s line will work with smart home devices across different brands. It’s a system built for versatility and designed specifically to lower the threshold for consumers to get started on their own smart home systems. [Photo: Ikea] Ikea didn’t reveal much about the products other than to say the goal was not to add technology for technology’s own sake. Instead, Ikea wants to build a smarter smart home that’s supportive and adaptable. Forthcoming products will replace the functions of existing products, Granath confirmed to The Verge, and a pair of Bluetooth speakers being released ahead of the wider January launch act as a preview. Nattbad, coming out this month, was designed to look like a vintage speaker in yellow, pink, or black, while Blomprakt, a table speaker-lamp that will come in beige, black, and blue, will be released in October. Both are minimal but attractive and signal Ikea’s general direction for home tech design. [Photo: Ikea] “We understand how people want to furnish with sound in a way that adds atmosphere and feels natural in the home,” Granath says. “Our aim is to make sound accessible, functional, and enjoyable without adding complexity.” This is smart home tech made easy. And if Ikea can deliver for consumers like it thinks it can, more connected homes could soon be coming to the massesand the retailer will mark its territory in the smart home space.
Category:
E-Commerce
Cybersecurity and data privacy are constantly in the news. Governments are passing new cybersecurity laws. Companies are investing in cybersecurity controls such as firewalls, encryption, and awareness training at record levels. And yet, people are losing ground on data privacy. In 2024, the Identity Theft Resource Center reported that companies sent out 1.3 billion notifications to the victims of data breaches. Thats more than triple the notices sent out the year before. Its clear that despite growing efforts, personal data breaches are not only continuing, but accelerating. What can you do about this situation? Many people think of the cybersecurity issue as a technical problem. Theyre right: Technical controls are an important part of protecting personal information, but they are not enough. As a professor of information technology, analytics, and operations at the University of Notre Dame, I study ways to protect personal privacy. Solid personal privacy protection is made up of three pillars: accessible technical controls, public awareness of the need for privacy, and public policies that prioritize personal privacy. Each plays a crucial role in protecting personal privacy. A weakness in any one puts the entire system at risk. The first line of defense Technology is the first line of defense, guarding access to computers that store data and encrypting information as it travels between computers to keep intruders from gaining access. But even the best security tools can fail when misused, misconfigured, or ignored. Two technical controls are especially important: encryption and multifactor authentication (MFA). These are the backbone of digital privacyand they work best when widely adopted and properly implemented. Encryption uses complex math to put sensitive data in an unreadable format that can only be unlocked with the right key. For example, your web browser uses HTTPS encryption to protect your information when you visit a secure webpage. This prevents anyone on your networkor any network between you and the websitefrom eavesdropping on your communications. Today, nearly all web traffic is encrypted in this way. But if were so good at encrypting data on networks, why are we still suffering all of these data breaches? The reality is that encrypting data in transit is only part of the challenge. Securing stored data We also need to protect data wherever its storedon phones, laptops, and the servers that make up cloud storage. Unfortunately, this is where security often falls short. Encrypting stored data, or data at rest, isnt as widespread as encrypting data that is moving from one place to another. While modern smartphones typically encrypt files by default, the same cant be said for cloud storage or company databases. Only 10% of organizations report that at least 80% of the information they have stored in the cloud is encrypted, according to a 2024 industry survey. This leaves a huge amount of unencrypted personal information potentially exposed if attackers manage to break in. Without encryption, breaking into a database is like opening an unlocked filing cabineteverything inside is accessible to the attacker. Multifactor authentication is a security measure that requires you to provide more than one form of verification before accessing sensitive information. This type of authentication is more difficult to crack than a password alone because it requires a combination of different types of information. It often combines something you know, such as a password, with something you have, such as a smartphone app that can generate a verification code or with something thats part of what you are, like a fingerprint. Proper use of multifactor authentication reduces the risk of compromise by 99.22%. While 83% of organizations require that their employees use multifactor authentication, according to another industry survey, this still leaves millions of accounts protected by nothing more than a password. As attackers grow more sophisticated and credential theft remains rampant, closing that 17% gap isnt just a best practiceits a necessity. Multifactor authentication is one of the simplest, most effective steps organizations can take to prevent data breaches, but it remains underused. Expanding its adoption could dramatically reduce the number of successful attacks each year. Awareness gives people the knowledge they need Even the best technology falls short when people make mistakes. Human error played a role in 68% of 2024 data breaches, according to a Verizon report. Organizations can mitigate this risk through employee training, data minimizationmeaning collecting only the information necessary for a task, then deleting it when its no longer neededand strict access controls. Policies, audits, and incident response plans can help organizations prepare for a possible data breach so they can stem the damage, see who is responsible and learn from the experience. Its also important to guard against insider threats and physical intrusion using physical safeguards such as locking down server rooms. Public policy holds organizations accountable Legal protections help hold organizations accountable in keeping data protected and giving people control over their data. The European Unions General Data Protection Regulation is one of the most comprehensive privacy laws in the world. It mandates strong data protection practices and gives people the right to access, correct, and delete their personal data. And the General Data Protection Regulation has teeth: In 2023, Meta was fined 1.2 billion (US$1.4 billion) when Facebook was found in violation. Despite years of discussion, the U.S. still has no comprehensive federal privacy law. Several proposals have been introduced in Congress, but none have made it across the finish line. In its place, a mix of state regulations and industry-specific rulessuch as the Health Inurance Portability and Accountability Act for health data and the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act for financial institutionsfill the gaps. Some states have passed their own privacy laws, but this patchwork leaves Americans with uneven protections and creates compliance headaches for businesses operating across jurisdictions. The tools, policies, and knowledge to protect personal data existbut peoples and institutions use of them still falls short. Stronger encryption, more widespread use of multifactor authentication, better training, and clearer legal standards could prevent many breaches. Its clear that these tools work. Whats needed now is the collective willand a unified federal mandateto put those protections in place. This article is part of a series on data privacy that explores who collects your data, what and how they collect, who sells and buys your data, what they all do with it, and what you can do about it. Mike Chapple is a teaching professor of IT, analytics, and operations at the University of Notre Dame. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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E-Commerce
So, you cried at work. In front of other people. Maybe it caught you off guardunexpected tears rising mid-sentence during a meeting, or an emotional wave you couldnt quite contain. Maybe you knew it was coming but thought you could hold it until later. And now, on top of whatever brought the tears in the first place, youre managing a second layer: the self-consciousness. The post-cry spiral. The wondering what they think. The wondering what this means. {"blockType":"creator-network-promo","data":{"mediaUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/03\/acupofambition_logo.jpg","headline":"A Cup of Ambition","description":"A biweekly newsletter for high-achieving moms who value having a meaningful career and being an involved parent, by Jessica Wilen. To learn more visit acupofambition.substack.com.","substackDomain":"https:\/\/acupofambition.substack.com","colorTheme":"salmon","redirectUrl":""}} If thats where you are, heres what I want you to hear: this happens. More often than people admit. And while it may not have been your plan, its not an indictment of your professionalism, your competence, or your leadership. What crying at work actually signals As a coach and therapist, Ive worked with dozens of women in the moment after this onethe part where you start replaying the scene, wondering if you lost credibility or if your colleagues now see you differently. And what Ive learned is this: Tears in a professional setting rarely happen out of nowhere. Theyre often the culmination of weeks, months, sometimes years of accumulation. Maybe its rooted in unspoken frustration, chronic overextension, casual sexism that youve absorbed and tried to rise above, situations that put you in no-win territory, or being told your feedback is so important but watching nothing change. Eventually, your internal emotional system starts to flag andsometimesthat results in tears. In many workplaces, crying in front of others still carries a social cost. There may be discomfort, silence, or even avoidance. Thats not because you did something wrongits because we havent built workplace cultures that know how to metabolize emotion. So what do you do now? A Professional Debrief Heres what I often walk clients through after a moment like this: 1. Take a neutral inventory What was happening in the room, both externally and internally? Think through both the words that were said and the dynamics at play. Were you under attack? Were you receiving feedback in a way that felt demeaning? Were you put in a position where your values felt compromised? Often, the tears arent about a single momenttheyre about a cumulative weight. Getting specific can help you separate the emotional release from the storyline of I lost control. 2. Dont rush to over-correct The instinct might be to overexplain or immediately send a follow-up message downplaying the moment. Thats not always necessary. If you feel a follow-up would serve younot just protect others from discomfortthen keep it simple and grounded: “Yesterdays conversation touched on something I care deeply about, and I had a strong response. I appreciate everyones professionalism, and Im clearheaded about where to go from here.” Theres no need for a drawn-out apology. Emotion isnt misconduct. 3. Zoom out. What system were you navigating? Women in leadership often carry a disproportionate burden of emotional regulation. You may be expected to be the one who brings empathy, maintains the calm, and absorbs tension. When that expectation becomes unsustainable, the moment you stop performing that role can feel disruptive. That doesnt make your feelings inappropriate. It makes the system worth examining. If youre still cringing Thats natural. Youre human. And most of us were conditioned to believe that our value at work rests on being cool, calm, and above it all. But from a professional perspective, one emotional momentespecially when it reflects real stress or high stakesdoesnt undo years of competence, credibility, or leadership. Its a data point, not a verdict. So the question becomes: what do you want to learn from it? Not in a punitive, How do I make sure this never happens again? waybut in a curious, Whats the system Ive been operating in, and what is it costing me? kind of way. Maybe youve been holding too much without support. Maybe something in your role or team culture needs repair. Maybe your values are rubbing up against something that isnt working anymore. Whatever it isits worth paying attention to. Pause and reflect Crying at work is not a character flaw. Its a moment of unscheduled honesty in a place that doesnt always make room for it. And while it may not have felt professional, it may have been true. And truth is always worth examining. If youre finding yourself stuck in the aftershocksruminating, replaying, pulling awayId invite you to pause. Not to fix yourself, but to reflect. With less judgment and more context. You are not the only one. You are not broken. And this moment doesnt define you. But it might be trying to tell you something important. {"blockType":"creator-network-promo","data":{"mediaUrl":"https:\/\/images.fastcompany.com\/image\/upload\/f_webp,q_auto,c_fit\/wp-cms-2\/2025\/03\/acupofambition_logo.jpg","headline":"A Cup of Ambition","description":"A biweekly newsletter for high-achieving moms who value having a meaningful career and being an involved parent, by Jessica Wilen. To learn more visit acupofambition.substack.com.","substackDomain":"https:\/\/acupofambition.substack.com","colorTheme":"salmon","redirectUrl":""}}
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E-Commerce
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