Your fridge could be a witness in a murder trial

I like my fridge, I really do... but when I get to the point of having a fridge with a camera, and a microphone - I feel like we've stepped over a line. What next... our toilet roll holders will have built-in microphones? Our showers will have 360-degree cameras for the next level of Big Brother voyeurism?

According to Mark Stokes, the head of the digital, cyber and communications forensics unit at the Metropolitan Police: "Wireless cameras within a device, such as fridge, may record the movement of owners and suspects. Doorbells that connect directly to apps on a user's phone can show who has rung the door and the owner or others may then remotely,m if they choose, to give controlled access to the premises while away from the property".

Stokes added: "All these leave a log and a trace of activity. The crime scene of tomorrow is going to be the internet of things".

If you think that Samsung's new Family Hub Fridge has a camera that features a live feed of the inside of your fridge, so that you can see what you need while you're at the shops - we're not too far away from an always-recording, always-on, always-listening appliance world.

This means that we'll live in a world where our appliances are recording the times and dates that people access the fridge (in this example), meaning they could be used as alibis, or to prove people were where they said they were. Or you could be like a certain network that uses Fallout 3 to show that Russia purportedly hacked the US elections (ugh).

Stokes said that detectives in the future would have a "digital forensics toolkit" that would let them analyze the microchips and download the data at the scene of the crime - which is great, your milk won't spoil as they won't need to take your fridge in for questioning.