AR: Innovation in information sharing and data access comes with risk

Augmented reality brings with it many benefits and applications, but also risk with regards to data management and information sharing, risks that need to be managed carefully.

Opportunity:

Boeing is a great example in showing the multiple applications of augmented reality within not only one industry, in this case aerospace, but also within one company.

Boeing collaborates closely with the company Upskill, an industry leader in augmented reality software, to develop and improve "Skylight", a software package provided by upskill which offers seamless integration of hands-free data and communication within the assembly department of Boeing through the use of Google's "Google Glass Enterprise Edition 2" as shown below in an excerpt from an article written by Michael E. Porter and James E. Heppelmann for the Harvard Business Review:

"AR is already redefining instruction, training, and coaching. These critical functions, which improve workforce productivity, are inherently costly and labor-intensive and often deliver uneven results. Written instructions for assembly tasks, for instance, are frequently hard and time-consuming to follow. Standard instructional videos aren’t interactive and can’t adapt to individual learning needs. In-person training is expensive and requires students and teachers to meet at a common site, sometimes repeatedly. And if the equipment about which students are being taught isn’t available, they may need extra training to transfer what they’ve learned to a real-world context.

AR addresses those issues by providing real-time, on-site, step-by-step visual guidance on tasks such as product assembly, machine operation, and warehouse picking. Complicated 2-D schematic representations of a procedure in a manual, for example, become interactive 3-D holograms that walk the user through the necessary processes. Little is left to the imagination or interpretation.

An employee at the agricultural equipment company Agco views AR instructions for work on a tractor hydraulic valvestack. - Clint Ford

 

At Boeing, AR training has had a dramatic impact on the productivity and quality of complex aircraft manufacturing procedures. In one Boeing study, AR was used to guide trainees through the 50 steps required to assemble an aircraft wing section involving 30 parts. With the help of AR, trainees completed the work in 35% less time than trainees using traditional 2-D drawings and documentation. And the number of trainees with little or no experience who could perform the operation correctly the first time increased by 90%.

AR-enabled devices can also transmit what an on-site user is seeing to a remote expert, who can respond with immediate guidance. In effect, this instantly puts the expert at the user’s side, regardless of location. This capability not only improves worker performance but substantially reduces costs—as Lee Company, which sells and services building systems, has discovered. It uses AR to help its field technicians with installations and repairs. A remote expert can see what the tech is viewing through his or her AR device, guide the tech through the work to be done, and even annotate the tech’s view with instructions. Getting expert support from a central location in real time has increased Lee’s tech utilization dramatically. And, by reducing the number of repeat visits, Lee saves more than $500 per technician per month in labor and travel costs. The company calculates a return of $20 on every dollar invested in AR.”

From this we can see that not only is this technology clearly viable, but that it will also most likely start to become the norm for companies striving to add value to their products by having AR become part of the product itself, or by improving related processes through the use of AR in areas such as manufacturing, maintenance and training.

Information and data handling:

With the increase in use of augmented reality for business processes, so too have the concerns regarding data leakage or information theft through AR also increased.

From a report written by Franziska Roesner, Tadayoshi Kohno and David Molnar regarding security and privacy for Augmented Reality Systems:

"To provide their intended functionality, AR applications may require access to a variety of sensor data, including video and audio feeds, GPS data, temperature, accelerometer readings, and more. As in desktop and smartphone operating systems, an important challenge for AR systems will be to balance the access required for functionality with the risk of an application stealing data or misusing that access. For example, a malicious application may leak the user’s location or video feed to its backend servers."

From an interview done by Aaron Mehta for DefenseNews.com:

"Fundamentally, artificial intelligence can’t work without access to massive amounts of data to train the algorithm on what to look for, what to ignore and how to respond. But for many firms, that data is proprietary.

So how will Boeing handle sharing its data in the era of AI? By being flexible, according to CEO Dennis Muilenburg.

“You’re going to see a variety of business models on that front. Data is becoming more and more important for all of our customers, defense and commercial, and there are a variety of visions for how you can leverage that data,” Muilenburg said July 15 ahead of the Farnborough Airshow.

“Some of that will be owned by the U.S. government or other governments that are coding these development programs. Some of these will be shared data. Some will be intellectual property that we will license.”

Muilenburg said defense customers are driving the conversation around sharing data for AI in a way the commercial sector isn’t. Given that the government customer is often the one that has most demands on data rights, that statement is notable.

“There are a variety of business models, and we have to be comfortable with the fact there have to be a variety of business models,” he concluded.

Leanne Caret, Boeing’s defense head, echoed those comments, saying “we will be handling this on an individual basis, depending on what the services, what the country is, what the customer is, and what works best for us collectively.”"

Boeing has also seen it's fair share of controversy in the past regarding their cybersecurity measures and alleged breaches resulting in vulnerabilities and potential information leakage. As a considerably large company with multiple investors and clients, many of which are from government sectors, this is of course a very great concern. 

If the handling of sensitive data is already this difficult, the addition of more systems which handle large volumes of critical process data may potentially add to the list of vulnerabilities and definitely poses a challenge in such a digital reliant environment.

In conclusion, augmented reality has a great amount of potential for application in most, if not all industries and provides for additional value within a business if implemented critically and creatively, but in the age of information, such a powerful tool that has such free access to critical data will require strict management and security protocol in order to protect not only the intellectual property of the company, but the personal information of their clients and contacts as well.

References:

Michael E. Porter & James E. Heppelmann (2017). A manager's guide to augmented reality. Retrieved on 23 September, 2020 from https://hbr.org/2017/11/a-managers-guide-to-augmented-reality

Franziska Roesner, Tadayoshi Kohno & David Molnar (2013). Security and Privacy for Augmented Reality Systems. Retrieved on 23 September, 2020 from https://ar-sec.cs.washington.edu/files/arsec-cacm2014-preprint.pdf

Aaron Mehta (2018). In age of AI, industry must keep an open mind about data sharing, Boeing head says. Retrieved on 23 September, 2020 from https://www.defensenews.com/digital-show-dailies/farnborough/2018/07/15/in-age-of-ai-industry-must-keep-an-open-mind-about-data-sharing-boeing-head-says/

Skylight (2020). Retrieved on 23 September, 2020 from https://upskill.io/functions/aerospace/ & https://upskill.io/skylight/why-skylight/

J.M. Porup (2019). Boeing's poor information security posture threatens passenger safety, national security, researcher says. Retrieved on 23 September, 2020 from https://www.csoonline.com/article/3451585/boeings-poor-information-security-posture-threatens-passenger-safety-national-security-researcher-s.html