The Internet of Things: IoT Applications and Security Challenges

The Internet of Things (IoT) is aimed at enabling the interconnection and integration of the physical world and the cyber space. It represents the trend of future networking, and leads the third wave of the IT industry revolution. In this article, we first introduce some background and related technologies of IoT and discuss the concepts and objectives of IoT. Then, we present the challenges and key scientific problems involved in IoT development.

The Internet of Things represents a vision in which the Internet extends into the real world embracing everyday objects. Physical items are no longer disconnected from the virtual world, but can be controlled remotely and can act as physical access points to Internet services. The Internet of Things vision is grounded in the belief that the steady advances in microelectronics, communications and information technology we have witnessed in recent years will continue into the foreseeable future. “Smart” objects play a key role in the Internet of Things vision, since embedded communication and information technology have the potential to revolutionize the utility of these objects. Using sensors, they are able to perceive their context, and via built-in networking capabilities they would be able to communicate with each other, access Internet services and interact with people. One logical development of the Internet of Things is to leverage the World Wide Web and its many technologies as an infrastructure for smart objects. One of the enabling technologies for the Internet of Things is RFID (Radio Frequency Identification). It is primarily used to identify objects from a distance, but can also be used to determine the approximate location of objects provided the position of the reader is known.