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Date: Mon, 11 May 2009 03:02:39 -0400
From: ed <ber..._at_netaxs.com>
To: TSCM-L2006_at_googlegroups.com
Subject: 'Cone of silence' keeps conversations secret
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(also see:
http://www.accumask.com/)
-ed
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227075.700-cone-of-silence-keeps-conversations-secret.html
'Cone of silence' keeps conversations secret
* 09 May 2009 by Paul Marks
* New Scientist Magazine issue 2707.
In Get Smart, the 1960s TV spy comedy, secret agents wanting a private
conversation would deploy the "cone of silence", a clear plastic contraption
lowered over the agents' heads. It never worked - they couldn't hear each other,
while eavesdroppers could pick up every word. Now a modern cone of silence that
we are assured will work is being patented by engineers Joe Paradiso and
Yasuhiro Ono of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Their idea, revealed in US patent application 2009/0097671 on 16 April, is to
make confidential conversations possible in open-plan offices and canteens. It
will even let a conversing group move around a room and still remain in a secure
sound bubble.
"In increasingly common open-plan offices, the violation of employees' privacy
can often become an issue, as third parties overhear their conversations
intentionally or unintentionally," the inventors say in their patent. Their aim
is to relieve people of that concern.
In open-plan offices, the violation of employees' privacy can often become an issue
Instead of plastic domes, they use a sensor network to work out where potential
eavesdroppers are, and speakers to generate a subtle masking sound at just the
right level.
It sounds simple, but it needs quite a bit of infrastructure. The walls of the
room must be peppered with light-switch-sized units that include a microphone, a
speaker, an infrared location sensor and networking circuitry connected to a
server. When somebody wants to activate what the MIT researchers call the "sound
shield", they do so on their desktop computer. Knowing the position of the
computer, the sensors identify the person and map out the locations of people
around them. Software assesses who is so close that they must be participants in
the conversation, and who might be a potential eavesdropper.
The array of speakers then aims a mix of white noise and randomised office
hubbub at the eavesdroppers. The subtle, confusing sound makes the conversation
unintelligible.
The ideas are not completely new - but what has gone before has big limitations,
says Paradiso. "Current systems put sound out from one source. The sound isn't
generally placed optimally between potential listeners and the people in
conversation so there can often be too much or too little masking noise."
For instance, the Babble, from Sonare Technologies, is a radio-sized machine
with two speakers that emits white noise from your desk to mask what you are
saying on the phone. But it is over-noisy, say the MIT team, and also fixed in
place, whereas their system's sensors can track people as they move around, and
shift the masking noise accordingly.
If they decide to press ahead and exploit the idea, the system will also advise
users whether there are other people too close by for it to assure secrecy.
"With people often working in large open-plan spaces now, the time has come for
ideas like this," says Paradiso.
Klaus Moeller, founder of sound-masking systems maker Logison of Oakville,
Ontario, Canada, is impressed with MIT's ambition but doubts its practicality.
Logison uses a proprietary technology called Accumask that masks only speech
frequencies to deaden voice transmission in offices - and it needs few fittings.
"I wish MIT the best of luck with their idea," says Moeller. "It sounds very
expensive and not very practical in an office environment." He thinks architects
may object to the many wall or ceiling-mounted devices the system needs to
follow people around the office.
Received on Sat Mar 02 2024 - 00:57:17 CST