Top Five Challenges in the World of IoT

We live in a world of technology where it evolves each day and there is not one dull moment. We have no choice but to grow with it. It is surprising to understand how quickly a newly found technology becomes the talk of the town. In no time, it moves through different stages of development and, a brand-new product or service is available to customers.

One such technology is the "Internet of Things", or better known as IoT. It was a term coined by Kevin Ashton in 1999. The technology gained momentum in 2011 after a Gartner report added it to a list of emerging technologies. 

IoT connects several sensors, alarms, cameras, lights, and microphones to provide 24X7 security. An example of an IoT is a smart doorbell security system that allows users to see, hear, and speak to visitors at their door via a computer, tablet, or mobile phone. This system is available commercially and sold on several online marketplaces. While it is a useful system in recent times, major security flaws in the device can put users at risk by being targeted at home by hackers. Cybersecurity specialists state that consumers are at liberty to choose between convenience and security that can be quite risky in case of inaccurate purchases.

What is the Internet of Things (IoT)? 

IoT is nothing but the coming-of-age revolution that aims to autonomously operate devices without human intervention while establishing machine-to-machine (M2M) communication. It is a dynamic network framework that intends to merge the physical and virtual domains by utilizing the internet as a medium for communication and data transmission.

Presently, there are five types of IoT applications:

1. Consumer IoT: Light fixtures, home appliances, and voice assistance.

2. Commercial IoT: Applications in healthcare, transport industry like monitoring systems, vehicle to vehicle communication (V2V).

3. Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT): Applications like digital control systems, statistical evaluation, and industrial big data.

4. Infrastructure IoT: Connectivity to smart cities with infrastructure sensors, management systems, and user-friendly apps.

5. Military Things (IoMT):  Applications in the military field like robots for surveillance and human-wearable biometrics for combat.

As digital transformation takes over, more and more organizations are adopting IoT technology. Experts estimate that more than 75 IoT billion devices will be connected to the web by 2025.

Having said the same, IoT has been facing many challenges, the main focus being on protecting privacy since it is one of the main reasons for restricted participation from the government and the private sector.

Top Five Challenges in IoT:

1. Scalability: 

Scalability is nothing but the ability of a device to adapt to the changes in the environment and meet the changing needs in the future. When you read it, you immediately translate it to “My system needs to be able to handle the data created for my current and future customer base.” 

It is certainly true but, it is just the tip of the iceberg. It is not a one size fit all thing. Some products need more capacity and upgrades than others and, it can be hard to predict what one may need two to three years or even five years down the road.

Internet of Things (IoT) is an explosively developing field and, scalability is an important factor that facilitates it. In the years to come, tens of billions of devices are coming online, which will present tremendous IoT scalability concerns. How will organizations possibly scale security and network policies to address all devices? 

For example, you add a new feature to your IoT device and soon roll it out to your customers. It is one of the most awaited features but, it requires a great deal of infrastructure to connect and upgrade the existing system. Also, wouldn't it be beneficial if you knew what features were most popular amongst your users? It would help to design a roadmap of future feature upgrades for your IoT devices.

If we configure IoT devices the way we have configured network devices over the last couple of years, it will not mean to set scalability requirements for IoT. Hence, it remains a challenge with "automation" being a possible answer for it. If one uses automation at scale, software and device management will be far easy.

2. Interoperability

As per a survey by McKinsey, “40% to 60% of the total value lies in the ability to achieve interoperability between different IoT systems. In IoT, interoperability is defined as the ability of two systems to communicate and share services.

With several vendors, OEMs, and service providers, it is difficult to maintain interoperability between different IoT systems. Sensors and networking are important components of IoT. Not every machine is built with advanced sensors and networking capabilities to communicate and share data effectively. Also, sensors of different power consumption capabilities and security standards inbuilt in machines may not provide the same results.

For example, a system that regulates the air conditioning of your home may speak a different language provided by its manufacturer than the one that controls the closing and opening of the windows of your home. It is because of the difference in the manufacturers and brands that will lead to difficulty in communication and coordination.

An even more serious example is if you are traveling in an autonomous vehicle and want to communicate your movements to other vehicles on the road to drive safely. An incompatibility of brands will make this information exchange difficult which is quite a serious concern, putting several lives at risk.

3. Security and Privacy:

IoT devices have two security challenges that are used at a large scale and long-life spans. IoT is diverse from traditional computers and computing devices, which makes it more vulnerable to security challenges in different ways. Many devices on the Internet of Things is designed for deployment on a massive scale. 

Usually, the deployment of IoT comprises of a set of alike or nearly identical appliances that bear similar characteristics. This similarity amplifies the magnitude of any vulnerability in the security that may significantly affect many of them.  Poorly secured IoT devices and services can serve as entry points for cyber-attacks, compromising sensitive data, weapons data, and threatening the safety of individual users. 

For example, security webcams deployed for various uses like home security and baby monitoring can pose severe threats in case of any software flaws that can lead to serious threats. A hacker can obtain the webcam's IP address, making it easy for him to look through it and sometimes listen as well. These possibilities of home invasions blur the line between the virtual and physical world and place the users in real, tangible danger.

4. Safety of Patients:

Many IoT devices are left unattended, as they are connected with real-world objects. In case they are used on patients as wearable devices, a technical error in security can be life-threatening for a patient. For example, smart medical devices are involved directly in-patient care, such as a continuous patient monitoring system or smart insulin pump.

When checking the performance of medical IoT software, testing specialists deal with the load, network bandwidth, latency, and other metrics both for mobile and web applications. A website shouldn't crash under an unexpected load surge in healthcare IoT.

As medical devices enter the mainstream, they face another performance testing challenge. It means that devices need new protocols to manage communication with the servers. The healthcare IoT ecosystem is a complex system since it lacks standardization of IoT protocols currently in use.  While the MQTT protocol is one of the most common because it handles low bandwidth networks and low-memory devices, there are also HTTP, CoAP, XMPP, DDS, and many others.  

5. Design-Based Challenge:

As technology evolves over the years, design challenges are increasing at a faster rate.  Some of the major design challenges faced in the Internet of Things are:

i. Finding the appropriate hardware

ii. Establishing connectivity

iii. Dealing with security issues

iv. Finding the right software

v. Cloud computing

The majority of the engineers say that finding the right hardware and establishing the proper form of connectivity are two of the biggest challenges. Also, in terms of security, the IoT industry is still going through growing pains. One of the biggest pain is developing best practices and platforms to deliver and manage IoT security for billions of connected devices.

  

The fourth challenge is finding the right software with, cloud computing being the fifth one. Having said the same, design engineers expect 5G to help in the continued growth of IoT. Many feel that 5G will lead to faster data connectivity and the development of IoT applications.

Final Thoughts

IoT is an exciting technology and has the potential to change the way we live, work, and play. But the IT industry, government, and customers must get on the same page to work out the issues and challenges faced by IoT so that it remains safe and productive to use.