IoT Cybersecurity... The World Of Unknown For Organizations And Nations!

- Mayank Lau

Internet power to connect, communicate and remotely manage millions of networked devices is becoming pervasive. The market and nations are gung-ho about IoT phenomena globally and so does India. As per pundits, the IoT devices count would reach to 20 to 30 billion by 2020. McKinsey global institute research estimated the probable impact of the IoT on the global economy might reach $6.2tn by 2025. Along with it, the Indian market is poised to reach $15bn by 2020 as cited by a NASSCOM study “IoT in India - The Next Big Wave”. Consumers and organizations both are feeling the IoT gravitational pull in their respective ecosystems. Consumers are adopting the wearables and consuming services with the help of networked devices at public place or at home. Classic examples are smart watch, smart apparel, internet based glucometer etc. Industry has also experienced the transition from closed networks to enterprise networks to public internet to deliver its business leveraging industrial internet of devices (IIoT).

Industry use cases which are gaining traction are such as but not limited to,(i) Oil, Gas and Mining, millions of IoT devices would be used at the extraction sites to provide insights into environmental metrics (ii) Manufacturers are expected to leverage sensors for machine to machine communications, remote maintenance, worker tracking and workload optimization etc. (iii) Agriculture where sensors would be placed underneath soil to check acidity levels, temperature and other variables that can help farmer in improving the crop yields (iv) Retail in which sensors on trolleys and CCTVs are used to track consumer behavior (v); Healthcare where operating devices are available to the doctors from remote places to conduct surgeries without physical presence in the hospital or with the help of robots (vi) Smart buildings, where organizations globally are already demonstrating IoT based energy efficient solutions to connect and monitor rooftop HVAC systems (vii