On Thursday, Nest Labs said that it would stop selling its high-tech smoke alarms while it develops a software update to correct a potential problem with a motion-detection feature.
Owners of the Nest Protect Smoke + Carbon Dioxide alarms can switch off the alarm with a wave f the arm. However, in a message on its website, Nest Labs says that during testing the company noticed that under “a unique combination of circumstances” the feature could be activated by accident, potentially delaying the warning of an actual fire.
Nest says it hasn’t received any customer complaints about the potential issue, but opted to halt sales of the device and automatically disable to feature in existing Nest alarms. The devices can connect to the Internet via WiFi, meaning that Nest Labs can disable the feature remotely.
Owners of existing Nest alarms are asked to connect them to their Internet Nest accounts so that the feature can be disable. Nest alarm owners who don’t wish to conned their alarms to the Internet will receive a full refund.
Nest Labs was acquired by Google (GOOG) earlier this year in a deal valued at $3.2 billion. The acquisition moved GOOG further into the growing “Internet of Everything” market for WiFi-connected home appliances.
GOOG has recently expanded its presence outside the Internet service market, purchasing a robotics company and launching Google Fiber, its own broadband deliver service.
GOOG stock rose modestly in Friday pre-market trading.
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