Posted on 02/24/2016 9:19:29 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Unless you've been living under a rock for the last couple of years, you've likely heard the term Internet of Things, or IoT, at some point. But what does it mean?
In short, the IoT is a network of objects connected to the Internet that can collect and exchange data.
That brand new car loaded with apps? Internet of Things. The smart home devices that let you control the thermostat and lights with one voice command? Internet of Things. That fitness tracker that lets you share your exercise progress with friends? You get the idea.
The IoT is set to transform the way we live, work, and interact with one another in the coming years. It might seem complicated at first, but the Internet of Things works through a relatively simple ecosystem.
A person uses a remote (such as a smartphone or tablet) to give a command or request information through a network to an IoT device, which performs the action and then sends it back through the network. The command or information is then displayed on the remote. This data can be stored in the cloud, on a local database, on the remote, on the IoT device itself.
The potential for the IoT is enormous, and Business Insider Intelligence estimates that there will be 24 billion IoT devices installed globally by 2020, with $6 trillion invested in IoT solutions over the next five years. This is due to several factors, including expanded Internet connectivity around the world, increasing mobile adoption, low-cost sensors, and larger IoT investments.
This IoT explosion is imminent, but revolution is already starting to affect everyday life with arrival of smart cars and homes. This IoT Revolution is picking up speed and when it does, it will change how we live, work, travel, entertain, and more...
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
I am going the other way, less tech.
Good article
Amish people chuckle at modern people.
I read that, and then I remember what Adama said in the pilot of the remake of Battlestar Galactica about networking all the computers.
Libtards will want to make it mandatory so that they can gain even more control over our lives. See mandatory smart meters so they can control how much energy you use as one of the first examples.
Yes, that long. Nearly forever in internet years:)
But I can't help but see IoT as nothing more than a bandwagon by makers to keep you buying. And buying.
And those who buy, as fools. As they will have given up every last sliver of privacy, every last iota of dignity in order to be cool.
Don't think for a moment that it will be possible to secure your home network or any of these devices. It's not possible now, and NSA/Congress is working against anything that might succeed.
After all, they have a national security interest in how much water/power you use, what temp your fridge is and how many of those you have, and what words are spoken in your home.
Fight it people. Fight it.
Leading the way to a jobless economy - if that is even possible.
I’ve read - and written - similar articles over the past 10 years. And here’s the bottom line: unless an IoT application makes economic sense, e.g. creates value that a customer is willing to pay for, it’s just a bunch of pipe dreams. It’s a simple rule - just apply it by asking “what is the value?” and “how many people will pay for it and how much” and then write your business plan and go cash in.
Or not.
But, outside of m2m in industrial and commercial applications, IoT doesn't YET have compelling business cases. Most companies are tire kicking right now because they frankly don't know what to do with the data even after they acquire it.
Security is also a MAJOR issue as most of this can be hacked or subverted. Now, what someone will do with worthless data after being hacked is one thing but security has to be addressed quickly.
Privacy, in the vain you discuss is often passe' with millenials who already assume everyone has their information. It's an interesting viewpoint.
After a month or two, they usually come back with one or two relevant value stories and begin the effort. But the whole idea of "everything connected" with big data and amazing value....is about 20 years away if at all.
Further, consider the math here:
“Business Insider Intelligence estimates that there will be 24 billion IoT devices installed globally by 2020, with $6 trillion invested in IoT solutions over the next five years”
To save the zero key on everyone’s calculator, that translates into roughly 5 billion devices being installed per year with an average cost of $250 per device.
Since the introduction of the iPhone, Apple has sold about 700 million, just for a point of comparision. So that woudl mean someone would have to figure out the value propositionk, design, build, and market these devices at a rate that vastly exceeds the rate at which iPhones have been sold, at a price of $250 each.
So, given today’s economy - does that sound reasonable to you? Or does it smell like the same flavor of BS we hear out of Obama’s labor department or the Obamacare experts who told us how much lower our healthcare costs would be under the “affordable care act”?
So far, the main ones cashing in on IoT hype are companies like “Business Insider Intelligence” who whip up some market research and find enough companies willing to spend a few grand to buy it. Not unlike those ads in the back of the magazines promising to tell you how to “Get Rich Quick” (put your own ad in the back of magazines!)
Israel, iran, and stuxnet come to mind. Working in the industrial controls business, I ‘ve seen a lot of factory automation that utilizes ethernet/internet protocols as a means to communicate with/control various machines and systems. With a factory intranet, any connection with an outside network has the potential for a system to be severely damaged or destroyed by malicious activity. And it’s not just financial loses people have to worry about. Imagine someone jacking into a refinery or chemical plant network, or pipeline or electrical transmission control network.
Exactly right - remember the old “M2M” magazine that quietly disappeared because no one could figure out why someone would care about having their toaster talk to their garage door opener? The solutions that DID stick like vehicle telematics did so because it was worth a lot of money to know when that truckload of goods would arrive. The same is true for many income-producing assets, but not for many things around the house that happen to have a cord. There are some good applications out there, the challenge is to find them, and hyped-up market studies don’t help do that at all.
The proper name is “Internet of Insecure Things”. There’s no telling how many trojans and virii are going to be hidden in all the cheap non-updateable things that will be inserted into home and business networks.
> Don’t think for a moment that it will be possible to secure your home network or any of these devices.
The current thinking is that the best course of action is to have a separate network (use some cheap router) for all of the various IOT devices. Thats the only way to be sure.
“But what does it mean?”
It means your toaster can text you that your toast popped up while you’re pooping on the toilet, which is a HUGE improvement over the way toasting toast works now.
It also means that if/when the Internet goes down on a national basis we’re going to be completely paralyzed, possibly permanently.
Even then, the risk is certainly present. Consider the Stuxnet virus that was designed to pass unnoticed through to PLCs that controlled the centrifuges and other equipment in the Iranian nuclear factories. Here you had a hardened industrial controller that communicated for benign purposes to a PC that was connected to the internet via not-cheap routers and professionally-designed network implementations - and you think you can foil such attacks by plopping a $30 Netgear router in front of your devices?
Of course there’s not much value in hacking whatever is behind those routers - unless a clever programmer finds a way to steal some information that is of value, like passwork keystrokes or credit card numbers - that can be regurgitated up through wide-open port 80 the next time you ask it whether you left the waffle iron on.
Internet connected stuff just for the sake of being internet connected. I think I will get along with a non smart toaster or refrigerator.
I wonder how long it will be before phone companies render land lines obsolete? As a side note, when was the last time you saw a pay phone?
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