Moreover, there is the serious issue of security. If everything becomes digitally interconnected, the likelihood of hacking attempts increases, as do the dangers if such attacks succeed.
There are, however, some downsides, with an unusually large number of CCTV cameras recording our movements. Using the IoT, organisations will be able to intensify personal surveillance.
Moreover, there is the serious issue of security. If everything becomes digitally interconnected, the likelihood of hacking attempts increases, as do the dangers if such attacks succeed.
For example, the Online Trust Alliance has drawn up a framework that identifies three factors the organisation says are essential to ensure the safety and reliability of any device, app or service on the IoT. The first two are security and privacy, but the third is sustainability, which the alliance says is often overlooked.
The authors of the framework define sustainability as the ‘life-cycle supportability of a device and the protection of the data after the warranty ends’. Craig Spiezle, executive director and president of the alliance, says: ‘Important capability gaps in privacy and security design remain. For example, when someone sells a house with a smart thermostat or garage door, how does the new owner ensure former users can no longer access these devices?’
He asks: ‘How do manufacturers protect against intrusions into smart TVs and theft of data collected from device cameras and microphones?’ But there are potentially more serious scenarios. Security experts are continuing to warn that IoT devices will be increasingly targeted by cyber-criminals in 2015, as uptake continues to grow among consumers and enterprises.
Indeed, security concerns are developing faster than even the IoT itself. This is especially true when you considered that IoT devices will be connected to smart grids, smart cities, water and gas utilities, energy organisations, transport etc. And domestic smart meters will connect homes to power utilities.
Knowing this, the potential for catastrophe is certainly clear, whether by accident, by virus intrusion or by hacking.
So, if we are not careful, massive security issues probably will (not might) one day cause catastrophic damage to our infrastructures unless these issues are seriously addressed quickly.
Looking at standards, it’s clear that this is already a crucially important, though already divisive, IoT topic. After all, how will devices connect to others without interoperability standards? Yet, devices so far conform to a range of often non-interoperable standards.
A cross-industry open source organisation, the AllSeen Alliance, (among others) believes that the IoT cannot meet its full potential without an open platform to ensure interoperability between devices from different manufacturers.
Then there’s new research by ON World, which finds that the wireless standard ZigBee, which is already used by many IoT devices, continues to increase its share of the IEEE 802.15.4 and smart home markets. By 2020, the study claims, ZigBee standards will be used in 8 out of 10 of the 802.15.4 chipset shipments.
Furthermore, in recent news, the Thread Group has announced that it has completed the specification and documentation for its IP-based wireless networking protocol for low-power connected devices in the home.
And these represent just a few examples of potential interoperability clashes for connected and IoT devices. Therefore, organisations such as the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC), and the European IoT-A (Internet of Things – Architecture) project, among others, are looking to provide architectural frameworks that define relationships between IoT domains and devices, as well as appropriate security schemes.
As these few examples show, it’s clear that there is much work to do where standards are concerned.
In any case, what is the point, some might say, in having a domestic IoT device for (say) monitoring your heartbeat that is interoperable with an IIoT plant controller? These are crucially important issues that must be worked out and agreed upon before the IoT can come near its ultimate take-up.