Smart Home Users Perception on Sustainable Urban Living and Legal Challenges in Malaysia

Smart homes can improve life by providing comfort, leisure, safety, and healthcare to residents. Nevertheless, the smart home concept depends on the integration on human and non-human intelligence, which raises a host of questions concerning its implication on legal liability. The legal issues in relation to definition of smart home, data protection, privacy, liability and insurance coverage. The aims of this paper is to discuss the perception of smart home users on the sustainable urban living and its challenges. This is a qualitative study and involves a small survey among smart home users in Kuala Lumpur. The findings show that there is no legal specific definition of smart home, there is no specific standard or specification issued by any regulatory bodies to regulate the network or appliances being used in smart homes. Majority of residents agreed that there are threats of privacy to smart home users. And privacy is not guaranteed and majority of residents agreed that their smart home and devices is not covered by insurance policy.  Hence, a policy and specific law or at least provisions regarding smart home must be drafted or inserted in the present statute initiated by the Ministry of Urban Wellbeing, Housing, and Local Government of Malaysia.