Home Automation?

[Jordanarduino]

Home Automation is always an interesting topic, what board should I use? Raspberry Pi or Arduino? And how would it connect to the world? Fm transmitters or wifi? Wired Or wireless? And how cheap can you get while keeping it reasonable safe

[Hoppingmadman]

Hey Jordanarduino, let me first give some book recommendations, Raspberry Pi Home Automation with Arduino, Building a Home Security System with BeagleBone and Programming Your Home. They are where I would start. Now, I have been think about this also myself. Now Raspberry Pi or Arduino, in my project I planned to use Raspberry Pi as I have an background in Linux programming, but the more I look into the Arduino you could achieve the same. So I say go with what you know best. How I would connect it, personally use wifi, but with that said if your network connection is not correctly secured, you could quite easily allow unwanted guesses into your house. There is an grate talk from Black Hat or Defcon talking about, hacking smart houses maybe something to watch to before installing something into your home.

Good luck with it all and keep us updated with the project, as it would be interesting to see the route you go.

[Glytch]

As for security, a properly secured WiFi network (especially if its separate from your WiFi you use for Internet access, which wouldnt be a bad idea, but would limit some possibilities) can be fairly secure and you can be fairly certain you are safe, unless you are being targeted for any specific reason, which is unlikely. Now, if you can find some cheap radio units that support encryption of some type, that would be your best bet. Not only would the attacker have to decrypt the communications, they would also have to figure out the protocol being used to control the various devices that you wrote. Now, while I'm all about sharing code etc, if you do a project like this, its not a bad idea to "sanitize" the code before you share it. Remove any info that could be used to decrypt your network, and change the values being sent back and forth, so the code still works, but is different from your setup, so its harder to figure out whats going on. Just keep in mind, no hardware or software is ever 100% secure. Someone will always be able to get in if they are dead set on it. Cant wait to see more on this project. Working on a voice recognition system for personal assistant/home automation setup for myself

[Jordanarduino]

Thanks Everyone and I'll be sure to post updates in the future! What about 433MHz transceivers?

[Hoppingmadman]

Very well said Glytch, security with home automation is something that most system on the market suck when it comes to even the most basic security.

[Glytch]

I agree, and when youve got bluetooth enabled dead bolts as the only thing between you, and a potential robber/killer standing outside your door, you want security. Not something that can be "hacked" with a bluetooth replay attack, as most systems on the market can be.

[Hoppingmadman]

I agree, and when youve got bluetooth enabled dead bolts as the only thing between you, and a potential robber/killer standing outside your door, you want security. Not something that can be "hacked" with a bluetooth replay attack, as most systems on the market can be.

Speaking of dead bolts you reminded me, or system here has an electronic dead bolt, here is the funny thing when we lose power the dead bolt unlocks..... So we end up never using it.

[Glytch]

Yep. Its a safety mechanism so in case of fire you dont get trapped in. Now a very easy way to combat this would to be to have a small battery inside the lock if you wanted to maintain the locked state, but be able unlock it remotely (in any other situation OTHER than a fire.) But thats an increase in the cost and a decrease in profits, so no company will go for it. Where as the maker community, thats not a problem at all.

[Eric]

I didn't even think about the fire-trapped aspect. Makes total sense

[Hoppingmadman]

Yeah, I didn't also think about that myself, only problem we face is that if the buglers in Mexico get wind of such an fault, well they will go around cutting the power in places they know body is there and well... And from what everyone has been saying this an problem that everyone faces here... LOL wouldn't have to worry in Australia, we don't even lock our house up.