• @henfredemars@infosec.pub
    link
    fedilink
    English
    906 months ago

    Ensuring that the system complies with industry standards and integrating security measures for cross-technology communication are also necessary steps, Gao adds.

    This is absolutely a huge factor that could make or break the technology if they don’t do this perfectly. This could be the single most important part of the tech.

    2.4 GHz is super saturated. The last thing we need is long range i.e. large footprint signals in already saturated spectrum. How this technology is deployed should either be not at all, or very carefully, to prevent widespread interference with existing WiFi devices. This spectrum is already on the verge of being complete trash. Please please do not be deploying more stuff on 2.4 spanning an entire “smart city.”

    • @rottingleaf@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      106 months ago

      This spectrum is already on the verge of being complete trash.

      Radio shouldn’t be used when avoidable. It’s for emergencies, aviation, hiking, short-range communication for convenience maybe. Phones - yes.

      But providing internet connectivity via radio when you can lay cable is just stupid.

      • @henfredemars@infosec.pub
        link
        fedilink
        English
        11
        edit-2
        6 months ago

        I mostly agree with you. I find it really weird how I live in a world where all my Internet is being run through 5G cellular for political and social reasons and not for technical ones. Due to the monopoly on the cables, it’s actually much cheaper here to buy 5G home internet. It seems unnecessarily complicated and choosing to use a shared medium for no reason. It’s just the politics.

        In case you’re not from the States, we have a monopoly pretty much everywhere for Internet services.

        With my 5G I have unlimited data, and it’s 300 down 44 up on a good day. It’s perfectly serviceable if you can live with increased latency.

        • @sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          26 months ago

          we have a monopoly pretty much everywhere for Internet services

          Fortunately, that’s not true everywhere, and municipal fiber is becoming more and more common.

          5G home internet

          The problem here is latency. It’s entirely sufficient for most web browsing and video streaming use-cases, but it sucks for multiplayer gaming and other interactive use-cases (e.g. video calls). So while it’s probably a solution for a lot of people, it’s not really a replacement for physical cables.

    • @rimjob_rainer@discuss.tchncs.de
      link
      fedilink
      English
      8
      edit-2
      6 months ago

      WiHi is already taken in Japanese for WiFi. They write WiFi but can’t pronounce WiFi (there is no Fi sillable), so they say WiHi. Source: I lived in Japan for a while.

      • I Cast Fist
        link
        fedilink
        English
        66 months ago

        Kinda weird that their only syllable with F sound is Fu, which goes in the Ha-He-Hi-Ho column

      • @sushibowl@feddit.nl
        link
        fedilink
        English
        26 months ago

        Technically there is no Hi syllable in Japanese either. There is ひ, which phonologically is neither “Hi” nor “Fi”, but somewhere in between. The exact pronunciation varies depending on surrounding sounds, as well as the speaker’s regional accent.

        So I wouldn’t say they really use WiHi. They write WiFi and they say “ワイハイ” which is the closest you can get to WiFi using Japanese sounds. It will kinda sound like WiHi to an English speaker.

        • @inconel@lemmy.ca
          link
          fedilink
          English
          46 months ago

          I don’t know where you get the information tho, it’s factually false.

          Japanese have have /h/, /ç/, /ɸ/ consonants in ハ行 (written as ha - hi - fu or hu -he - ho but pronounced differently). The consonant /ɸ/ is generally transcribed as f in alphabet.

          フ(f+u) is the only letter that pronaunce /ɸ/ in regular ハ行, but ファ行 (f + other vowels) indicates sounds with /ɸ/.

          Transcription of wifi in Japanese is ワイファイ, not ワイハイ.

  • @essteeyou@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    29
    edit-2
    6 months ago

    Maybe I’m being overly paranoid (this is Lemmy, after all), but doesn’t this seem like a step toward something troubling?

    1. Almost all of our devices are designed to use WiFi. Just try finding a laptop with an ethernet port, or a phone or tablet with wired connectivity. You can get adapters, sure, but they’re not standard anymore. I wouldn’t be surprised if game consoles eventually drop wired options altogether, or charge extra for them—like Sony does with the PS5 disc drive.
    2. ISPs have a track record of trying to control our internet experience—remember the fight over net neutrality? They’re always looking for ways to monetize data and restrict what we can access online.
    3. With long-range WiFi on the horizon, ISPs might find it cheaper to install one powerful broadcast device per neighborhood, similar to how 5G towers are deployed.
    4. And when that happens, it’s not that features like fiber to the home or port forwarding are gone, but they could be locked behind an extra fee. Want direct access to your own network settings? That might come at a premium. Even access to certain websites could become conditional on paying more, or worse, dictated by someone else’s agenda.
    • @turmacar@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      446 months ago

      What are you talking about?

      This is not about streaming to a laptop or Internet access. This is about a long range, low power, low bandwidth network using 2.4GHz. It’s using 2.4GHz, like everyone else likes to, because it’s the “free” signal band that you don’t have to pay to license. It’s for sending the message “Sprinkler head 1039A is leaking” from a solar panel powered transmitter without having to run a data cable or network repeaters.

      It’s competition for Zigbee/Z-Wave/Matter. Not the herald of the ISP crackdown Armageddon.

    • @catloaf@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      English
      186 months ago

      Laptops with Ethernet are still pretty common. I just bought one recently. At work, we buy a lot of them. But I don’t think smartphones ever had integrated wired networking.

      But that aside, what you’re describing is already happening. Wireless network deployments are much, much cheaper than running wire to each building. In semi-rural areas, WiSPs are pretty common. And 5G for home Internet access is pretty common in high-coverage areas. And as time goes on, the ISP-provided equipment is more locked down.

      But I don’t think those things are related.

      • jaxxed
        link
        fedilink
        English
        1
        edit-2
        6 months ago

        Not in the US, but every LTE home internet provider I’ve dealt with is just a SIM that you can use in any off the shelf LTE/5G to wifi router setup. Mikrotik options are cheap and can handle simple one-device implementations, and multi-device mesh setups (that require more effort to configure)

    • @amorpheus@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      136 months ago

      And when that happens, it’s not that features like fiber to the home or port forwarding are gone, but they could be locked behind an extra fee. Want direct access to your own network settings? That might come at a premium. Even access to certain websites could become conditional on paying more, or worse, dictated by someone else’s agenda.

      They can do that right now. If this new wireless option is standardized, it would seem less prone to ISP shenanigans to me. Just a question whatever functionality makes it into the standard in the first place.

    • @Brkdncr@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      76 months ago

      I think the article is explaining that this is really just modifying wifi protocols to work over LoRa, to reduce LoRa costs.

      This will probably only be beneficial to people currently using LoRa.

      • jaxxed
        link
        fedilink
        English
        26 months ago

        I thought that LORA was optimized for low data throughput? Running WIFI over such a link would suck.

    • @pycorax@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      36 months ago

      I can find this believable in the US maybe (only stayed there for a few months and I heard nothing good, data caps on broadband is wild) but not a chance in countries with stricter regulations and guidelines on what the ISPs are allowed to do.

      • @AA5B@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        1
        edit-2
        6 months ago

        I don’t understand this (haven’t read the article, which probably explains that) but this thread is all over the place with different interpretations.

        Mine is this is another local IoT network like Zigbee, zwave, thread, even Bluetooth. The latest z-wave standard includes a longer range functionality. LoRa is another such local IoT network. The use case is smart home or business devices, like a light switch or a thermostat. They are much lower power to suit battery powered devices and generally need very little bandwidth. You may have a central hub that can remotely control all your devices or manage automations. However a key feature is local. These are not directly connected to the internet, but may have a bridge to your network for connectivity.

        But LoRa is expensive and requires a lot of configuration. If this means that WiFi can come with some of the LoRa connectivity and bridge configuration already done, then you’re making it much easier to set up such a local IoT network

    • @jagged_circle@feddit.nl
      link
      fedilink
      English
      26 months ago

      Just tell them you have a low packet loss tolerance. The wire will never be cut. It can’t replace a wire for many use cases

  • Mossy Feathers (She/They)
    link
    fedilink
    English
    246 months ago

    I’m kinda looking forward to seeing how this pans out. Personally, I’d want to use it to make small, local hobby networks; kinda like how it used to be that basically anyone with a phone line could start an ISP.

    • @Burn_The_Right@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      5
      edit-2
      6 months ago

      Hell yes. Perhaps an interconnected network of mesh nodes could become an alternative FOSS internet within our lifetimes.

    • @AA5B@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      16 months ago

      Me too but it’s not well suited for a use case like that. Think of it for data logging and control of remote devices. Maybe you have a battery powered sensor in a field to track moisture levels, or a light switch in an outbuilding that you want to make sure is shut off without walking out there.

      Similar networking that is more accessible to consumers might be Zigbee, z-wave or Thread.

      Matter/Thread is the latest consumer standard, and is supported by major players like Apple and Amazon (don’t remember if Google is still on board). its strengths include standardized device type profiles (so every light switch has the same definition of off and on) and well-defined integration between Thread (local wireless mesh network) and Matter (IoT protocol over Ethernet/WiFi) making it more likely that everything works together. It has a lot of potential, but has been slow to roll out.

  • @werefreeatlast@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    English
    106 months ago

    No thanks! 👍 Is there any way we could make a standard where unknown servers trying to run apps from google locally on my devices could be auto blocked? I’d love a standard like that.

    "Hey we removed Google photos since they turned on the camera without your consent. We did that remotely! While you were out "

    That WiFi, I would like.