Coffee plays a fundamental role in the development of the internet. Not just because it fuels late night coding sessions.
Did you know that the first webcam was pointed at a coffee machine? (The Trojan Room coffee machine at the Cambridge University Computer Lab.)
Now, it looks like a coffee machine may become the first domestic appliance to be targeted by hackers. The Jura Impressa F90 has an optional Internet Connection Kit. This allows you to remotely change settings such as how strong the coffee is.
According a report on BugTraq / Security Focus, it is possible to program settings that break the coffee machine. Worse, the connection software has vulnerabilities that would allow a hacker remote access to the computer that ran it. (Hat tip Boing Boing.)
As security problems go, this is somewhat recherché. But it could be the first in a new wave of security problems. According to Cnet, there is already an Internet-connected refrigerator, at least one prototype of a Web-enabled oven, and pilot tests for dryers and water heaters.
After all, nobody thought that a camera pointed at a coffee machine in Cambridge would spawn a hundred million phone and web cams.
