Tunnel vision
Looking ahead 20 years, Jain said vehicles will travel through underground tunnels at high speed, and the public transportation system will carry passengers on electric "skates" at speeds of between 200 and 240 kilometers per hour.
The Boring Company, an infrastructure and tunnel construction outfit founded by US entrepreneur Elon Musk, is developing tunnels and hyperloop trains to make the plan a reality.
In theory, drivers will park their cars on pallets, known as "skates", and the vehicles will then be carried along the tunnels.
However, the concept has provoked skepticism, especially as the cost of digging the tunnels is potentially enormous, estimated to be about $1 billion per 1.5 km.
According to Musk, his technology could reduce the cost to $250 million per 1.5 km, with the diameter of the tunnel reduced by a factor of two or more, and he believes it would be possible to stack the skates on top of each other to increase capacity.
Wilfred Lau, chairman of the Association of Consulting Engineers of Hong Kong, agreed that the concept could work: "Tunnel transport is suitable for intercity travel."
Lau has a vision of a hyperloop tube running from Hong Kong's Central district to Shenzhen, Guangdong province, with one or two stops in Kowloon and another in the New Territories before the line terminates at Shenzhen.
Zhang Lei, a researcher at the Division of Smart Cities at Hong Kong Polytechnic University, warned that it would be difficult to burrow deeper underground to make a sprawling tunnel network: "It's more challenging in Hong Kong, which is mountainous and has a high population density."
Those factors mean the city is vulnerable to subsidence and landslides, while earthquake-prone areas and places where fracking for oil is taking place are susceptible to instability. Deep tunneling could cause varying levels of damage to surface buildings and potentially create safety hazards, Zhang said.
Privacy concerns
Despite the prospects painted by the smart city experts, one persistent concern remains - privacy. Any device that connects to the internet has flaws that may be exploited by hackers, and the "smart city" concept is based on sharing, collecting and analyzing data. In the worst-case scenario, private information related to income and bank accounts could be at risk.
Yeung, from the Smart City Consortium, believes a balance must be struck between smart technologies and potential dangers. "If we don't share personal information on mobile devices with the internet, there's no big data and the technologies become useless. But if we share, there's a potential risk," he said.
Businesses are probably most vulnerable to cybersecurity threats, according to Jain, from the Civic Exchange think tank.
Last year, the average cost of global cybercrime was $11.7 million per organization, a report by Accenture and the Ponemon Institute noted. In 2016, the figure was $9.5 million, and it has risen by 62 percent in the past five years.
Last year, nearly 70 percent of business respondents from Hong Kong experienced losses as a result of cybercrime, according to The State of Cybersecurity in Asia-Pacific, a survey conducted by Palo Alto Networks, a business security company.
However, even though companies can create effective protection systems, risks will always remain. The reality is that even if a business does not wish to be part of the movement, its personal data will have already been recorded digitally and is therefore vulnerable.
"Companies' future business models and their success will depend on how effectively they implement cybersecurity measures," Jain said.
According to Yeung, while Hong Kong is ahead of many places in Asia in terms of protection of online privacy, more must be done to provide better security.
He is working with the Hong Kong Productivity Council on the implementation of a security standard for the internet of things that will offer guidance to customers choosing IoT devices. Suppliers of IoT products can participate in the program if they choose.
"Customers must want to buy products with recognized safety labels, which will enhance credibility and serve as an incentive for producers of IoT devices to improve their security measures," he said.
Eric Chong, president and CEO of Siemens Hong Kong and Macao, said: "Hong Kong has well-enforced rules to protect data privacy. With regard to the changing landscape, the data privacy laws are stringent and they will be reviewed from time to time to keep up with the city's development."
Practical issues
Zheng, of Huawei, said a number of practical issues will need to be resolved before Hong Kong can become a truly "smart" city. For example, popularization of driverless vehicles would prompt a sea change, such as massive layoffs across the industry.
In addition, Yeung noted that factors such as finance will need to be considered before progress is made, because building a smart city is a costly enterprise - a fact that is especially true for Hong Kong.
"The city was quite well-developed before the smart city concept was introduced, which means we will need to replace the old infrastructures and the aging installations with smart ones," he said.
