Japanese smart city presents residents quake, privacy protection
Digital tools launched in a Japanese smart metropolis that may send disaster alerts to safeguard residents are portion of an optional technology push looking to overcome community and economic challenges, even while also allaying privacy fears.
The smartphone alerts were introduced in Aizuwakamatsu city, Fukushima Prefecture, the other day by consultancy firm Accenture, which includes worked with researchers to revitalise metropolis using technology since a devastating earthquake in 2011.
Aizuwakamatsu residents can decide to subscribe to the digital solutions - a markedly different approach to the required initiatives in other smart cities that have been held again by data personal privacy and surveillance issues, said Shojiro Nakamura, co-lead of Accenture Advancement Center Fukushima.
"Opt-in may be the fundamental approach inside our smart metropolis initiatives," he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
"Most smart city info derives from citizens' activities - energy use, healthcare, etc - and who owns the data is the citizen, sometimes if it is placed by companies or treatment centers. So it is critical that citizens have control over the amount to which their info is accessible," he added.
Other digital tools wanted to residents of Aizuwakamatsu are on the areas of mobility, education, healthcare, and energy consumption. Residents can opt in and show any degree of information they are more comfortable with.
Cities all over the world are actually racing to embrace technology found in a bid to boost urban life by collecting data to address problems such as for example traffic gridlock, criminal offense and waste management.
Global spending on wise cities initiatives was estimated going to nearly $124 billion this past year, according to the Intercontinental Data Corporation (IDC), in a report released before world-wide lockdowns to contain the coronavirus pandemic.
Japan and Latin America were forecast to start to see the fastest growth in shelling out for smart cities.
In Japan, intelligent cities became a location of focus after the 2011 earthquake and tsunami, with local governments partnering with businesses and experts to tackle social and economic issues including an ageing population and the impacts of climate change, with technologies such as for example artificial intelligence (AI).
Appliance makers Panasonic and Hitachi, and messaging application LINE are among other companies working on smart cities found in Japan.
Toyota Engine Corp broke ground previous month on a fresh smart city in close proximity to Tokyo, that the automaker said is a "living laboratory" to check and develop autonomous vehicles, robotics, personal mobility and AI for residents.
"Building a complete city from the bottom up, possibly on a little scale like this, is a distinctive chance to develop future technologies," Toyota president Akio Toyoda said at the ground-breaking ceremony at the website, a former vehicle factory.
In China also, Alibaba Group Holdings, Tencent Holdings and Baidu are among companies participating in the government-led preparation greater than 100 smart cities.
But while these initiatives include the potential to resolve problems, discussions about smart cities found in Japan are as well "technology-oriented" and "efficiency-oriented", said Yoshinori Hiroi, a good professor at Kyoto University.
"More human elements ought to be considered," said Hiroi, an advisor at Smart City Institute Japan, citing advancements to the walkabilty of cities.
"We need more varied agents such as for example general citizens and nonprofits to be engaged in the creation of smart places in Japan," he added.
Source: japantoday.com
