Robot vacuums are one of the few things from the sci-fi movies I watched as a kid that actually came true.I might not have a flying car, but I've already owned a few robots that did a half-decent job of keeping my floors clean.But in none of those stories were these jolly little cleaning robots on you.
Yet, we've heard a few horror stories about robot vacuums and privacy over the years.Surely by now there must be a way to have your floors clean and keep your privacy intact? Your robot vacuum knows more about your home than you think There's no privacy in a robot apocalypse Back in 2023 (as reported in Fortune) one poor woman who was beta testing a new robot vacuum had photos of her using the bathroom posted online.These photos were taken with the cameras on the vacuum.
While I have to emphasize that the whole situation was pretty atypical, it's a stark reminder that robot vacuums are basically roving sensor platforms with free rein in your home and an active internet connection.They don't just look around either, modern robot vacuums use technologies like Lidar or AI-powered vision systems to create detailed 3D maps of your house.They can identify and classify objects, and so much more.
Obviously, these robots need these sensors and capabilities to do the job.But that does nothing to change the fact that these devices gather this data, process it, and store it for later use.We can all rightly ask what's stopping the company that makes that robot from sending that information back to base? Or, what about data breaches or unruly staff? Even if the intentions are pure (and that's a heck of an "if"), it does seem like a nasty risk.
Eufy Omni C28 Battery Life Vacuum and Mop: 123min / Vacuum: 216min Color Black The Eufy Omni C28 features a real‑time self‑cleaning mop brush for consistent, whole‑home cleaning without interruptions.$800 at Amazon Expand Collapse The cloud isn’t actually required for a smart vacuum It's all smoke and mirrors What makes this all feel particularly icky is that there's no real need for your robot vacuum to have a cloud connection.You've probably noticed that your robot vacuums are perfectly capable of doing their usual cleaning even when the internet is down.
Having an online account and cloud connection is mainly used as an excuse for app-based control of the device but, again, this is an artificial requirement.There's no reason why a robot vacuum can't just talk directly to an app over your LAN or directly via something like Bluetooth.Valetudo cuts the manufacturer’s servers out of the loop Taking back what you paid for Which brings me to the star of the show: Valetudo.
This is an open-source firmware replacement largely maintained by one dedicated person and a group of contributors.Assuming you have a robot on the supported list, you can root the device and load Valetudo.It's not custom firmware in the proper sense, but more like a jailbroken version of the vacuum's regular firmware.
As per the words of the project itself, the main goal of Valetudo is to remove the cloud from your robot vacuum.To give you control over it and the data it collects, and to remove your dependency on a third party when it comes to what your vacuum can do and when it can do it.You gain local control, Home Assistant integration, and more True liberation With Valetudo, you no longer need an app to control your vacuum.
Instead, you can use any device with a modern browser to log into a locally-hosted website and manage the device from there.Of course, you don't have to manually control every vacuum like this.You can integrate it with your automation system.
Home Assistant is the obvious choice here because it's self-hosted and also without unnecessary cloud connections.But, I think the most exciting thing here is that it removes premature obsolescence from your device.As long as you can get spare parts for your vacuums, they'll keep working even if the company that made them goes out of business.
Robot vacuums are expensive, and if there's no physical reason to replace them every few years, why should you be forced to just because the app no longer works or there are no more updates? This way you can get the most out of your robot vacuum.There are some catches before you start flashing firmware While this all sounds great, I am obligated to talk about the downsides, and there are a few.For one thing, you might have to void your warranty to root your vacuums.
For another, you could brick your vacuum, and of course only a specific list of models are even compatible.Rooting the robot, depending on the model, might involve quite a bit of disassembly.If you haven't actually bought a robot yet, you might want to check the compatibility list just to see which models are the easiest to root and flash.
Also, it's possible you'll lose some features on your vacuum, and updates may be slow or never arrive, since it depends on Valetudo being able to crack future firmware updates.If all the stars align for you, though, Valetudo makes it much less likely that photos of you doing your morning routine will end up on the internet unless you put them there on purpose.
Read More
