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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
A smart refrigerator, also known as internet refrigerator, is a refrigerator which is able to communicate with the internet.[1] This kind of refrigerator is often equipped to determine itself whenever a food item needs to be replenished.[2] This is still partly managed by human involvement but the next evolution of smart technology is the Intelligent Refrigerator, which incorporates inventory tracking for all items inside, along with a seamless payment system. This involves connecting the refrigerator to an online retail store, ensuring a consistently stocked refrigerator at home for domestic use. For commercial use, additional features such as payment terminals and locks are integrated to manage tasks like unattended retail and queue busting.
By the late 1990s and the early 2000s, the idea of connecting home appliances to the internet (Internet of Things) had been popularized and was seen as the next big thing.[3] In June 2000, LG launched the world's first internet refrigerator, the Internet Digital DIOS. This refrigerator was an unsuccessful product because the consumers had seen it as unnecessary and expensive (more than $20,000).[4]
In 2000, Russian anti-virus company Kaspersky Lab warned that in a few years Internet-connected refrigerator and other household appliances may be targets of net viruses, such as ones that could be designed to make the refrigerator door swing open in the middle of the night.[5] In January 2014, the California security firm Proofpoint, Inc. announced that it discovered a large “botnet” which infected an internet-connected refrigerator, as well as other home appliances, and then delivered more than 750,000 malicious emails.[6] In August 2015, security company Pen Test Partners discovered a vulnerability in the internet-connected refrigerator Samsung model RF28HMELBSR that can be exploited to steal Gmail users' login credentials.[7]
In late 2014, several owners of internet-connected Samsung refrigerators complained that they could not log into their Google Calendars accounts, after Google had discontinued the calendar API earlier in the year and Samsung failed to push a software update for the refrigerator.[8][9]