14 Jan Technology Trends for 2020
Last year was an interesting year for technology. We saw the introduction of foldable smart phones (that admittedly flopped), a rise in demand for Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the form of Amazons Alexa and continued growth as people continued to adopt Smart Tech for their homes.
In addition, we also saw how Virtual Reality (VR) can have the ability to help dementia patients, letting them relive some of their fondest memories. 2019 also saw the introduction of 5G networks, allowing us to download and search faster than ever before, despite all of the controversy surrounding it.
What can we expect to see this year? Flying Ubers? Drone Deliveries? Or even a full AI robot. Well here is what experts are saying will be big in 2020.
The 5G Network
Despite all of the controversy around 5G networks, its forecast to continue to grow in popularity with more people adopting it and using it. More and more of our gadgets will have 5G compatibility and will have faster connections than ever. In addition, this will also bring potential new security threats! The controversy over 5G networks and security started with Huawei and continued, as we are not 100% sure what new threats 5g could bring However, Despite the politics around 5G networks, it will continue to move forward, making headway and delivering new opportunities to both businesses and consumers.
Hyper Automation
Whilst this seems like a rather confusing and grand concept in layman’s terms / words that we can understand, it means that we can now automate technologies such as AI and machine learning. The result, we can have the ability to use a mixture of automation and AI to expand our own human capabilities. For example, Through hyper automation some medial tasks will run with little human interference or involvement. This will potentially reduce the risks of human error and expand the capacities of the human work force. AI has already been tested in detection of certain cancers and has proved successful.
The Emergence of New Threats
Technology gives and takes, new threats could and will emerge from technologies such as the 5G network and new applications. With more connected devices globally at both at work and home there are now huge benefits to attacking IOT devices.
This could create a perfect storm for new unexpected threats to grow alongside our old favourites. For example, car jackers using smart tech to be being able to hack into cars in order to steal them, better than a trusty crowbar, I guess. In addition, we may see arise in hackers looking to leverage our automated devices to glean information about us and our lives. Smart tech brings smart threats. Scary stuff.
Human Augmentation
If you are old enough, you may remember Lee Majors and the bionic man, or the crew of the Star Ship Enterprise under the threat of assimilation by the Borg. Believe it or not this isn’t a million miles from reality. We are now taking steps to improve ourselves by using technology to make us work smarter, be more efficient and even stronger. Fear not, we don’t mean we will become cyborgs or anything, but just using tech to improve ourselves.
We are use human augmentation (at a low level) with smart apps and technology being used to improve our diet, sleep, fitness and well being.
Multi Experience
The way that we experience technology will become more immersive than ever before. we may see start to use multiple technologies delivering more interaction with multi sensory interfaces to create more immersive experiences. This means we will probably see arise in. more Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality technologies.
Some are predicting that we will also see this in the workplace. We will continue to change the way in which we experience technology one such use will be the Microsoft Hololens. This tech could affect where and how we work and potentially, how consumers interact with companies in the future.
Even More AI in Security to Combat Rising Threats.
With the rise of Hyper Automation and other technologies, comes the rise in cyber threats.
We earlier mentioned, how the growth in new technology creates new threats, these threats can also be combatted using the new technology. Bit of a catch 22 really! We will use machine learning and AI to add intelligence to our cyber defences.
We can use this new technology to identify different patterns in security and uncover more attacks, helping us to anticipate what type, and when attacks may come and help us to be able implement defences for them. With the rise in connected devices and data It makes sense to use this smart technology to help us defend against the very threats it creates.
In Conclusion
Whilst some of these predictions like folding phones or driver less cars are not particularly sexy, they do give us insight into some areas we may see development this year. Then again Technology can be so unpredictable, that you never know what might pop up. We could even accidentally create Skynet making this blog obsolete!
We can only hope that technology moves in the right direction to improve our lives even further than it has already.