At the beginning of May 2022, CNN revealed that Russian looters, with the help of the Russian army, stole about 27 agricultural tools manufactured by the John Deere company from Litopol, Ukraine, with a total value of five million dollars.
The theft didn’t pay off for the thieves because John Deere, the tractor manufacturer, disabled the stolen tractors with a built-in kill switch. Seemingly, a happy ending – the thieves will not enjoy the stolen property, but the incident brought up some disturbing points that caught the attention of the farmers and the media, and is reviewed in detail:
- The control of manufacturers over the equipment they produce “over the heads” of the legal owners of the equipment in a way that turns them from owners of property to holders of a license to use
- The integration of sensors in the equipment and the manufacturers’ control over the data produced using the same equipment
- Cyber danger – if the company’s authorized technicians can disable equipment remotely, there is a danger that hostile elements could take over the communication and disrupt the operation of the equipment.
From the event, we learned that John Deere tractors are equipped with sensors that monitor many parameters such as soil compaction, soil moistur,e and more. The tractor became a data manufacturer as much as it was a work tool and John Deere became a company that made agricultural tools into a data company. It processes unique and valuable information, produces insights and, sells them to various stakeholders in the world.
Corey Doctorov of the Davidson Institute described the case and its implications in detail. Thanks to my friend DigitalRosh Gerry Mendelson, for the reference to the article and his reference to it. To read the full article and Gerry’s comment, click the buttons below.