Kaspersky Lab has introduced an interactive multimedia project which aims to accumulate predictions about global social and technological developments for the next 30 years.
According to the cyber security and anti-virus provider, Earth 2050 was formed by Kaspersky Lab experts in collaboration with a team of futurologists such as Ian Pearson, and has received input from global artists and scientists to assist them develop a realistic view of the not-so-distant future. Kaspersky Lab says the initiative will provide insight and understanding into what the world will look like in future, so that citizens can better understand the technological opportunities and challenges the future will bring.
Examples of some of the questions the initiative will attempt to answer are: "If all our lives are digitalised, how will we handle privacy? If people have all their devices implanted inside them and their data in the cloud, how will that data be protected? If there are no endpoints anymore, will the industry move quicker towards providing security solutions which adapt to customer circumstances, regardless of which device they are using at any one time?," notes Kaspersky Lab.
Andrey Lavrentyev, head of Technology Research Department at Kaspersky Lab, says: "All of the forecasts you can find about Earth 2050 could become a reality in just a couple of decades. Earth 2050 is not only a creative exercise for us. For the last 20 years, Kaspersky Lab experts have been fighting with cybercrime, and they have seen threats evolving over this time. They are therefore able to share their knowledge and expertise and - in many cases - encourage users to take a more thorough look at the security of future technologies. Although inventions might be amazing - such as like driverless cars, intelligent infrastructure and the ability to instantly share medical data between doctors across the world - they can still trip us up. Each of them brings a whole new world of opportunity for cyber criminals to exploit."
At the moment Earth 2050 contains predictions for 80 cities around the globe. Some of the predictions include looking into the era of cars without drivers; transcontinental flights in three hours; the future of ships without captains, underwater restaurants and more.
Kaspersky has invited users to help shape this vision of the future by studying over 200 predictions online, and submit their visions for inclusion of their thoughts and their city on the Earth 2050 site by filling in a feedback form.
The portal is divided into three time categories: 2030, 2040 and 2050, with each of these containing predictions from people who are recognised experts in their fields. For example, users can explore the thoughts of Pearson and different experts at Kaspersky Lab about what the future holds.
"We hope to see many more names on the portal and encourage our users and site visitors to send us their craziest ideas on what the future might look like," concludes Lavrentyev.
Earth 2050 also contains 12 virtual reality-enabled panoramas of cities like Barcelona and Shanghai, as well as illustrations of different artefacts from the future. Users can take a 360o look at how future cities might be operating.
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