I wrote yesterday’s post about cyber-cloaking while thinking about the recent article in the New York Times claiming that Google will soon be coming out with augmented reality glasses.
A.R. glasses are essentially a form of client/server technology. As you walk around in the world, you are the client, and a remote server that knows your location is downloading content into the wearable computer that drives your display glasses. In that sense wearable A.R. is not all that different from the client/server architecture we use every day when we browse the web.
Except that A.R. cloaking attacks could be a lot more interesting and scary. Imagine somebody being able to hack into your very perception of the world around you. For example, you and your friends are walking down the street together, all wearing the latest and greatest designer A.R. shades, checking out cool virtual sculptures, store displays, interactive movie ads. What you don’t know is that a clever cloaking attack is targeting just you, so that you only think you are seeing what everyone else is seeing.
I’ll leave it to you to imagine what such a perception attack could be used for. The possibilities, I’m afraid, are endless.