From innovations for athletes to unprecedented surveillance tools for authorities, examine the technologies to be able to shape the Sochi Olympics.
The 2014 Winter Olympics, scheduled to start out Feb. 7 in Sochi, Russia, will test both athletes and technology. For the competitors, the character of the contest remains much because it always have been: an extreme physical and mental challenge. However the athletes’ tools could be different, because of ongoing research and new approaches to many of the winter sports on the games.
Competitors might be trying to their equipment for a performance edge. Uniforms and other gear were designed and engineered to lessen friction and aerodynamic drag. And efforts to maintain athletes healthy and to fix their injuries are pushing the bounds of medical technology.
For Olympic officials, their Russian hosts, security personnel, representatives of media organizations, and individuals attending the games, technology may even shape the development.
Sochi 2014 would be the surveillance Olympics. Attendees “will face many of the most invasive and systematic spying and surveillance within the history of the Games,” reported The Guardian last fall, noting that Russia’s FSB security service plans to observe all communications in and around Sochi. But given what’s become known in regards to the reach folks intelligence agencies, the FSB’s surveillance plan may evoke a feeling of déjà vu.
There would be drones, facial recognition systems, patrol boats equipped to warn of underwater attackers, and extensive network monitoring. In recent days, US and Russian officials were discussing whether america is willing to help with security by providing technology to jam signals that would be used to detonate remote bombs.
Russia’s security concerns are hardly unique for an Olympic event — some 13,500 British troops were deployed to give protection to the London 2012 games — nor are they without reason: Because the State Department notes in its warning to Sochi travelers, there were recent terror incidents within the Russian city of Volgograd and a regional terrorist group, Caucasus Emirates, withdrew prior directions not to attack the Winter Olympics.
However, the watchful eye of the authorities takes on a more sinister aspect in light of Russia’s recent law banning “propaganda” that promotes non-traditional relationships and its suppression of investigative reporting.
The games themselves depend upon technology, not only for timing, scorekeeping, and communication, but to guarantee the presence of adequate amounts of snow: The ski runs around Sochi would be targeted by about 400 snowmaking cannons and swaths of snow will preserved beneath thermal insulation blankets.
Let the games begin and let the technology do more good than harm.
Image source: Olympic.org
Thomas Claburn is editor-at-large for InformationWeek. He have been writing about business and technology since 1996, for publications reminiscent of New Architect, PC Computing, InformationWeek, Salon, Wired, and Ziff Davis Smart Business. Before that, he worked in film and tv. He’s the writer of a science fiction novel, Reflecting Fires, and his mobile game Blocfall Free is out there for iOS, Android, and Kindle Fire.
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