Implantable medical devices could become a major focus of security research in the near future, according to Tadayoshi Kohno, a University of Washington assistant professor and TR35 honoree who appeared today at the Emerging Technologies Conference. Kohno says that security measures need to be an integral part of wireless medical computational devices implanted in the body, such as devices that would monitor the blood of diabetics and administer insulin when needed. Although much work is currently going into building such devices, Kohno says that he isn’t seeing sufficient discussion of related security and privacy issues at this point.

Ivan Krstic, director of security architecture at One Laptop per Child and also a TR35 honoree, says that lack of incentive to make systems secure is part of the problem.