The “Internet of things” (IoT) is becoming an emerging technology in the workplace, as well as outside of it. The concept of IoT is going to change our lives and our work style as a whole. There is an endless opportunity that can be forecasted by using IoT, which may be beyond our imagination. 

In this blog, we will discuss the technical aspects of IoT (Internet of things). We will get to know about the concept of IoT and the terms related to it and its functions. Moreover, we will cover the security issues of IoT as part of basic concepts. 

Related post – What does Internet of Things mean for India?

What is IoT, and its main elements

The Internet of Things can be defined as the network of physically connected objects. These can be seen as the ‘things’ embedded with electronics, uses software programs, and sensors through network connectivity, enabling these ‘things ‘to receive and exchange data between themselves. Using IoT, objects could be sensed and controlled remotely across the existing network.

This, in turn, creates opportunities for further direct integration between the physical objects and computer-based systems. Ultimately this results in improved efficiency with accuracy and economic benefit. The ‘Things’ in the Internet of Things can be anything like Cars, different daily usage appliances, even a heart monitor. The wide usage of Broadband Internet with Wi-fi capabilities and inbuilt sensors has made IoT a big success. 

As per the current statistics, IoT usage will enhance significantly in coming years – 

With the below image, we can get an overview of how massive could be IoT use across industries – 

Functional overview of IoT

Elements of Internet of Things

As per the IEEE, the Internet of Things elements can be segregated into five main elements. Below are the names of the elements with descriptions for each of the elements:

1. Identification: This plays an essential role in naming as well matching services as per their demand. Electronic product codes, ubiquitous codes are examples of identification.

 2. Sensing: This is for gathering information from related objects. This sensing system sends data to a database or data warehouse, or data center as per the demand. The collected data is then analyzed to do device-specific actions as per the required services. Sensing can be biometric, biological, environmental, visual or audible, or a combination of all the above.

3. Communication technologies: This is used to connect different objects to offer specific services. In the Internet of Things, various communication protocols are used for such communications are seen in the gateway table below. Sometimes GPS is used for positioning.

4. Computation: The cloud is an essential part of IoT for computational. It is instrumental in processing heterogeneous data for real-time purposes and extracting all vital information from collected data. Several hardware processing units, like microprocessors, SoCs (system on chips), plays crucial roles in this activity. Apart from this, programmable gate arrays and software applications perform this task. Recently various software platforms are utilized for this purpose along with other hardware platforms like Arduino or Raspberry Pi.

5. Services: This can be categorized into four categories concerning IoT, and they are

• Identity-related services – These types of services provide the base for other kinds of services, as every application needs to identify the object first before mapping it to real-world objects into the virtual world.
• Information aggregation services – These types of services collect and summarize the raw information. Finally, this information needs to be processed and reported.
• Collaborative-aware services – These services are used to make decisions and react accordingly based on the collected data.
• Ubiquitous services – These types of services are additional services and are used to offer collaborative-aware services on demand irrespective of time, place, and person.

Semantic: This refers to acquiring knowledge intelligently, which can be useful to provide the required services. This process follows some steps like – 

· discovering resources

· utilizing resources

· modeling information

· recognizing and analyzing data 

Some of the standard semantic technologies used in IoT are resource description framework, web ontology language, efficient XML interchange, etc. Below is the IoT architecture with elements.

Broad categories of IoT elements

IoT elements can be seen of three categories – 

• Hardware
• Software
• Cloud

 Hardware-wise we can find below elements of IoT hardware:

• Low energy sensors
• Communication services – gateways, modems, routers
• Touch screens and battery support/power

As per IEEE, we can map out IoT categories and the elements present within each as per the below table:

More in-depth details about sensor elements are given in the below tables –

Gateways –

IoT Security & Privacy

With the invention of IoT, devices have become more connected, enabling us in a more hi-tech life. However, security and privacy have become the point of concern as confidential data is now more opened through the internet. This is a really concerning issue for the consumers and businesses. As per the 2016 Vormetric Data Threat Report, sensitive data ranked as the top concern at 36% of those polled among companies.

With the growing number of connected devices across the internet, cyber-attacks have become an alarming threat for consumers and organizations. As with IoT cars, critical infrastructure, homes are connected through the internet, and these are more prone to be attacked by hackers. So, cybersecurity must be a focused area while applying IoT for any application or infrastructure.

 The below diagram shows the possible threat areas for IoT devices – 

Why the Internet of Things can enhance your application?

Internet of Things can be used in almost every sector of society and industries. IoT industries can be spanned across three groups of consumers, governments, and ecosystems that will benefit from the IoT. These include:

We can see how IoT can be beneficial and enhance any application. Here are few examples – 

Applications of the Internet of Things

Smart Home: The smart home is the most popular application in the market which has implemented IoT technology. Its popularity lies in its affordability; as well, it is readily available to consumers. The smart home application includes Amazon Echo, Nest Thermostat, and hundreds of such products on the market. Users can control these applications with their voices, which make their lives more connected than ever. The Amazon Echo works through Alexa, which is its voice assistant. Through Alexa, users can ask this application to play music, provide a weather report, get sports scores, order an Uber, and more.

Wearables: Smartwatches are available in the market, like the Apple Watch, which turns our wrists as the holder for smartphones. Using these smartwatches, one can do text messaging, phone calls, and much more activities. We can see smart devices like Fitbit, Jawbone which are revolutionary fitness products that give users more data related to their workouts. The Fitbit can track users’ steps, the number of floors climbed, calories burned, and sleep quality. The device can wirelessly sync with computers and smartphones and transmit the user’s fitness data to understandable charts, which the user can use to monitor his progress.

 Smart Cities: With the application of IoT, an entire city can be transformed into a smart city where all its citizens’ real problems can be solved smartly. One such example is with proper connectivity and data, IoT can solve a city’s traffic congestion problem. It has similar capabilities to resolve pollution, noise, and many more. The Spanish city is one example of a Smart city that has implemented many IoT applications like smart parking etc.

 Connected Car: Smart cars are equipped with Internet access, which can share this access with others. It is similar to connecting to a wireless network in a home or office. AT&T added 1.3 million cars to its network in the second quarter of 2016, which makes the total number of cars it connects to 9.5 million. For these smart cars, Drivers don’t need to subscribe or pay a monthly fee for data as AT&T to count them as subscribers.

Conclusion

In this article, we have discussed how beneficial it could be the Internet of Things in our near future. As a broader view, the IoT will most likely be beneficial for the ecosystem. But implementing IoT in a broader range may impact energy waste globally, which will be needed to update consumer devices to implement new technology. However, it would be beneficial when IoT connects entire cities. This will allow public transport and new construction to save energy on a broader scale.

Along with these benefits, we have to keep in mind the security threats related to IoT, impacting anyone massively. We have discussed that with IoT application, we can get scope the full benefit of the supply chain from warehouse management to the logistics, from operations and retail to post-sales data capture. However, security implications arise due to the lack of communications standards between different IoT devices. Perhaps the biggest challenge lies further when machine intelligence and machine learning-driven cyber-physical systems become the norm. 

References

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  [2] Q. L. Z. W. Ping Lou, “Agile Supply Chain Management over the Internet of Things,” in IEEE, Wuhan, China, 2011. 

  [3] U. Shankar, “How the Internet of Things Impacts Supply Chains,” inboundlogistics.com, [Online]. Available: http://www.inboundlogistics.com/cms/article/how-the-internet-of-things-impacts-supply-chains/. [Accessed 2017].

  [4] M. Murray, “How the IoT Will Revolutionize Supply Chain Management,” rtinsights.com, [Online]. Available: https://www.rtinsights.com/supply-chain-optimization-with-iot/. [Accessed 2017].

  [5] A. Meola, “Internet of Things devices, applications & examples,” Business Insider, 2016. [Online]. Available: http://www.businessinsider.com/internet-of-things-devices-applications-examples-2016-8?IR=T. [Accessed 2017].

  [6] H. S. Machado, “http://apicsterragrande.org/images/articles/Machado__Internet_of_Things_impacts_on_Supply_Chain,” [Online]. Available: http://apicsterragrande.org/images/articles/Machado__Internet_of_Things_impacts_on_Supply_Chain_Shah_Machado_Second_Place_Grad.pdf.