Robo-vacuum maker wants to sell user data to third parties

How many smart devices are in your home, aside from the smart TV?  It seems each day brings a new gadget ready to connect to our infrastructure, but users forget that each device is a new opportunity to collect data.

Roomba creator, iRobot, has just announced that in the next two years the company will change its business model into one of selling user data to third parties such as Amazon, Apple and Google’s Alphabet. So after you pay between $375 and $899 for a vacuum cleaner, you could also unknowingly give away personal information.

For now, user’s permission is requested, yet the company could still get away with selling data without user consent because the “terms of service currently give the company permission to share customer data with third party vendors and subsidiaries, and to comply with government requests,” writes The Telegraph. CEO Colin Angle is confident users will give their consent to benefit from all the smart home functions.

The smart vacuum is currently compatible only with Alexa but the plan is to expand the partnership with other tech giants. Using the incorporated IoT sensors, the vacuums take in data about floor space and distances between smart home devices to accurately recreate the floorplan.

“There’s an entire ecosystem of things and services that the smart home can deliver once you have a rich map of the home that the user has allowed to be shared,” explained iRobot CEO, Colin Angle.

Investors are already showing interest, as the company’s stock has grown to $106 currently from $38 a year ago, giving it a market value of approximately $2.9 billion, as of market closing today.