Home Assistant encryption + sleep triggers
Home Assistant is prepping a 2026.4 update with modernized, independently audited encryption for user backups — a big privacy boost for self-hosted smart homes (hackster.io). Community automations are getting creative too — users report integrating Home Assistant with OyasumiVR for sleep detection to auto-turn off displays and even trigger lights from smartwatch 'death detection' jokes, showing what’s possible at the hobbyist level ( ).
The Open Home Foundation commissioned an independent security review of SecureTar v3 that was performed by security firm Trail of Bits and published as a March 2026 report. (github.com) Trail of Bits’ review recorded two informational issues and one medium‑severity issue in SecureTar v3, all of which were fixed upstream before the rollout. (hackster.io) Home Assistant’s codebase shows the project bump to the 2026.4 line in late February 2026 and multiple outlets report the 2026.4 branch will enable the new backup format by April 1, 2026. (github.com) (howtogeek.com) SecureTar v3 switches Home Assistant backups to Argon2id for password-based key derivation and XChaCha20‑Poly1305 via libsodium for authenticated encryption, changes documented in the project notes and the Hackster writeup. (github.com) (hackster.io) OyasumiVR added Home Assistant integration via MQTT in the v1.13 update (announced June 19, 2024), exposing entities such as a Sleep Mode switch, Heart Rate sensor, and a Shutdown Sequence button that hobbyists can subscribe to from Home Assistant. (patreon.com) (store.steampowered.com) Steam and community guides explicitly show OyasumiVR users building automations that automatically turn off smart lights, dim HMD brightness, power‑limit GPUs, and shut down controllers when the app reports the Sleep Mode state via MQTT to Home Assistant. (store.steampowered.com) (steamcommunity.com) Home Assistant’s mobile/watch companion apps expose wearable sensors and actions (Apple Watch support since iOS app 2024.9 and Wear OS sensors), and Home Assistant community threads show users tying hard‑fall or pulse sensors and other wearable/fall‑detection devices into automations — the same hooks hobbyists repurpose for tongue‑in‑cheek “death detection” triggers. (companion.home-assistant.io) (community.home-assistant.io)
