What is the Internet of Things (IoT) in this 2022 Era?

IoT and cloud

Collaboration with cloud services is essential for the spread of IoT. The development of cloud services has greatly expanded the range of IoT applications.

Providing an integrated environment

The operation of applications that operate IoT and the processing of acquired data are performed on servers on the cloud. Recently, major cloud vendors have started offering integrated services for IoT solutions, operating IoT services via the cloud, such as OS distribution for IoT devices, secure communication with devices, log acquisition, and data analysis processing. The services that should be done are packaged and ready to use.

The operation of IoT services requires not only software but also an architectural design that considers the communication environment and software operation on the device side. In addition, these services can be linked with DB and server services other than IoT-related services to provide a wider range of IoT solutions.

Stream processing

Many IoT services require real-time performance, such as factory anomaly detection. Stream processing is a technology for continuously processing data to meet these needs. A stream, as the name suggests, represents a continuous flow of data from your device to a server in the cloud.

Generally, many services send and receive data in arbitrary units in consideration of communication costs, so communication between device servers is intermittent. On the other hand, in stream processing, communication between the device and the server is non-intermittent, so data processing can be performed with minimal time lag even in real-time processing. Stream processing is not a technology limited to IoT, but is being used in various areas such as video distribution and advertisement distribution.

IoT security risks and countermeasures

Connecting to www (World Wide Web)

The www (World Wide Web), or connection to the Internet, has made devices accessible from anywhere in the world. On the other hand, it carries many risks. For example, it is quite conceivable that a malicious attacker could take control of an IoT device and abuse it in some way.

Also, due to the nature of the data sent by IoT devices, there are cases were storing it in the cloud should be avoided. In cases where the information itself has great value, such as personal DNA information obtained through medical equipment or environmental information on the factory owned by a specific company, the information should be handled only in a closed environment. In such cases, it is necessary to take measures such as installing an edge server near the IoT device and filtering the data sent to the cloud as much as possible.

Change default password

Passwords can be set for many IoT devices, but there are many cases where the password is not changed when starting to use it, making it vulnerable to attackers.

Abuse of Bluetooth

The main IoT communication standards are HTTP(S) and Bluetooth, and there are many examples of using Bluetooth, especially in short-range communication. However, due to the nature of Bluetooth, anyone within a short distance of the device can recognize its existence and depend on the device, the connection between devices can be established without authentication. As a result, there are cases where problems occur due to data transmission and reception using a Bluetooth connection.

Mesh network

A mesh network is one of the network communication technologies, and its name derives from the state in which multiple devices are connected in a mesh. A mesh network is a technology that provides a stable network environment at all times by searching for communication between other devices in a self-healing manner, even if the connection between specific devices is interrupted during its lifetime. Originally, it consisted of Wi-Fi communication, but in the past few years, the practical use of mesh networks has been progressing even with the Bluetooth standard.

In IoT, not only fixedly installed devices but also portable devices such as smartphones change their location, connect to networks unique to each region, and perform various operations. Therefore, to build a private mesh network, it is necessary to design security on the premise of joining and leaving the network. If the connection to a private network were always permitted without such identification, the risk of confidential information being leaked would suddenly increase in the case of short-range communication such as Bluetooth, just by recognizing the device. increase.

Therefore, in Bluetooth mesh network technology, encrypted communication and the existence of an authentication key assigned to each device participating in the network play an important role as a security measure. This authentication key is updated when a device joins or leaves. Therefore, even if an attacker attempts to access the network using a device that has failed and left the network, the authentication key of the failed device is outdated, so participation in the network will not be accepted. increase.

Summary

IoT technology is already permeating deeply from households to industries. A future in which everything in the world will be connected to the Internet, including smart homes and smart cities, is just around the corner. While these technologies have made people’s lives and work dramatically more convenient, they have also increased security risks such as information leaks and misuse. Amid these changes, we must understand how these technologies are used and what kind of risks they pose, and be conscious that the use of IoT technology as a society as a whole will head in the right direction. We sought.