The Internet of Things (IoT) denotes environments in which objects, processes, devices, systems, or services are inextricably interconnected and part of a networked ecosystem capable of talking to one another and exchanging data. The devices that make this possible are connected via the internet and contain sensors that collect data and also have the necessary software to interpret, transfer, and receive data. Fundamentally, the IoT is about data exchange. At a high level, an IoT environment consists of devices and equipment, and the people who use and control them. Today, we think of those devices and equipment containing a blend of valuable data, sensors, and embedded computing and networking capabilities that can remotely acquire data and control their behavior.
A network of systems might be built to accomplish some business objective or application. Two current and common examples are the utilities’ application for remotely monitoring, controlling, and optimizing urban electrical power systems for efficiency and accompanying new customer services, and the dislocated infrastructure protection application to remotely monitor and protect operationally essential infrastructure, such as bridges and tunnels, where they are at risk in case of an avian flu pandemic. The systems in the network have their own distinctive working functions and related data sets within the application: the power system might have meters, transformers, and demand management systems, and traffic protection infrastructure might have chemical and biological sensor networks. Although each type of network is specific, both are concerned with monitoring data, sharing control data, and network management to ensure the infrastructure services are reliable. Each exposes some programmatic interface for machine-to-machine data interaction, adjustment, and command that makes a framework for distributed network operations in the larger application. The IoT is not a technology, but rather a comprehensive framework that represents the collective use of numerous technological innovations. Evolving over time, it marks the next phase in the evolution of automation.
Benefits of IoT
The Internet of Things (IoT) not only has the potential to impact how systems are managed and optimized for better business results but also to change how people interact with the ‘things’ in their environment. Organizational investment in IoT is typically driven by the promise of the operational benefits it can provide. These potential benefits spread across various industries and can provide improvements in: 1. Efficiency and productivity 2. Enhanced decision-making 3. Cost savings/gains/revenues 4. Environmental impact 5. Customer experience IoT technologies drive operational benefits through their ability to automate processes, optimize the use of resources, optimize responses to demand or changes, improve the quality of decisions, and provide more accurate or timely information to people who use that information to make decisions. Specifically, IoT facilitates the alignment of operational assets with operational objectives, which helps maximize the return on assets and increases the value of the operations these assets contribute to. Organizational investments in IoT are justified based on the cost and value of technology that must be introduced into a system that does not use it today. One of the major enablers of operational efficiency with IoT technology is the advancement of data analytics and the ability to perform analytics at the edge of the network on data that the devices produce. The analysis of data from operational technology provides operational insights that were previously difficult to obtain. These ever-growing IoT benefits are evidenced by case studies spanning industries, for example: • In retail, using in-store cameras for more than just security prevents theft and shoplifting. Heat maps of foot traffic guide better merchandise placement, and finally, offline shoppers can be tracked for shop design. • In healthcare, wearables provide 24/7 monitoring for patients with the chances of early detection and savings from a central monitoring point at a hospital.
Enhanced Efficiency and Productivity
While numerous benefits of the IoT have been widely acknowledged, enhanced efficiency is arguably the most frequently emphasized aspect of the IoT. Particularly, the IoT provides the ability to monitor properties and processes in real time, respond to them automatically in an intelligent manner, and perform control using automation. Automation reduces human intervention and the possibility of errors, while control in real time allows another process to be embarked on even before the present one is complete. In industries such as manufacturing and logistics, IoT devices allow organizations to reduce downtime and optimize supply chains. The IoT eases routine operation, augments office and employee productivity, cuts operating costs at an extensive scale, reduces human investigation due to predictive maintenance, lays bare insights to new business models, and entirely streamlines the central operation of supply chains. The IoT enables the combination of more interconnected, smarter, and mobile technologies. These integrated systems and devices interwork and, in turn, capture pest control data that are utilized to command and manage pest control. Pest-assailing outbreaks are eliminated and managed through real-time tracking, coordinating, and regulating. The pest control devices, animals, and agents fetch agronomic data to track, regulate, and automate the productivity of livestock, field tackles, machinery, agro-crates, water consumption, and available labor. A slew of scholarly research underpins the assertion that automation improves organizational outcomes, fundamentals, productiveness, and office efficiency. Expert opinions and policy reports have also highlighted the role of the IoT as a driving force in accelerating efficiency within industrial operations and logistics. The IoT supports real-time, human-powered efficiency while providing the possibility for an even more significant degree of office automation and efficiency through controllable automation, analytics, robotics, and artificial intelligence. The IoT makes it possible to know the availability and utilization of resources and even humans. Knowing the extent of usage of resources and people helps applied social sciences guide and manage organizational choices most optimal to utilize both the resources and people. Furthermore, the tools simplify supply chain visualization, data analytics, talent evolution, management, predictive maintenance, and self-manageable smart appliances and automation.
Improved Decision Making
In addition to increasing efficiency, one of the main benefits of the IoT is that it can enable more sophisticated decision-making processes. IoT-enabled “things” generate vast amounts of data, and with the right cross-domain analytics, users can examine the data to not only explain an event but also recommend an action. Although plenty of data has been generated for quite some time, with the IoT many additional pieces of information, such as location data and status data, can be added to a basic data frame to generate a richer analysis. In general, the increase in the quality of decision-making is certainly important, particularly in the era of big data, where large and complex datasets require advanced analytics to interpret. In the context of businesses, improved decision-making allows for competitive advantages. For example, the implementation of big data analytics has resulted in the company reducing the distance traveled by trucks by 85 million miles over several years, resulting in both financial benefits and, importantly, an increase in efficiency. Similarly, machine learning has been used to optimize supply chains, minimizing the number of stock-out events and further minimizing unnecessary stock levels. There are also many other sectors and applications in which improvements can be made using IoT data, from optimizing crop irrigation systems on a farm to providing simulated racing events with real-time statistics.
Real-time or near-real-time strategic decisions, such as decreasing the price of a product when demand is low, can also be improved using IoT data. One of the advantages of using IoT-based analytics for real-time systems rather than existing systems is that data can be taken from a variety of sources, offering both short- and long-term views of events. A company whose analytics are based on historic point-of-sale data might not be able to respond to real-time demand and therefore adjust prices and/or product levels as quickly as one that incorporates real-time market data from a variety of sources, including images and tweets; for example, by identifying trends or patterns in real time that would not usually be captured by simply analyzing point-of-sale data. In addition to this, consumer preferences and responses to products and marketing can be interpreted from IoT data and incorporated into consumer profiles, providing deeper insights for decision-making. For example, by aggregating location data and information about fantasy football leagues, it was discovered that around 30% of participants in the annual draft encouraged car-free transport to the event. Real-time data, however, does not just relate to capturing up-to-the-second data; it also relates to the capture and quick interpretation of “fresh” data to identify new long-term trends or threats. In the same location as this activity, sales of quality cars fell significantly around the time the car-share opened, and similar trends point to a new threat to the car-parking industry in general.
Cost Savings and Revenue Generation
Cost savings and revenue generation lie at the heart of the financial benefits of Internet of Things (IoT) solutions. 73% of executives were using IoT for cost savings in 2017. Global cost savings derived from IoT products and services will amount to $1.02 trillion by 2030, arising from operational and capital expenditure savings in data processing and storage, among others. Through IoT, efficiency gains can reduce the amount of energy, food, water, and other resources required, adding up to an estimated reduction of 90,000 tons of carbon emissions in the U.S. alone. For organizations, operational savings such as labor, water, and energy costs can significantly decrease overall spending at the business unit level. Greater efficiency can cut enterprise costs by over 40%, driving 33% of total potential value.
One way that organizations can save on costs with the IoT is through energy management. Minute inefficiencies in voltage control and power generation maintenance can lead to energy wastage. Implementing an IoT system can enable organizations further to reduce operational costs by leveraging predictive maintenance. The operational efficiencies of IoT technology need not only be cost savers. As organizations implement commercial-grade IoT systems on a large scale, they are finally coming up with a way to prove to business stakeholders that the data harvested can create value in an organization. This value might shift from cost savings to innovative services and business models. Companies are leveraging IoT data to empower highly personalized concierge services for their customers. In various reports, it is revealed that 96% of higher-technology manufacturing customers are generating more revenue from their IoT investments. A case study of an operator reveals that 54% of companies say IoT is boosting revenue by an average of 36%. Some organizations are leveraging IoT operational agility to impact sales while also reducing downtime.
Challenges of IoT
The benefits of deploying the Internet of Things (IoT) can only be realized if the many challenges are addressed, including those related to privacy and security. Currently, there is concern about the security of IoT devices, including end devices, networks, and cloud-based back-end systems. Once a hacker has broken into a system, data can be lost or used in unintended circumstances. As in most systems, the weakest link is often the easiest way into the system. In this case, it is most often access via software; malware and social engineering are the most common hacking exploits. Attacks such as wiretapping, misdirection, and jamming are also applicable to IoT.
Given the data that IoT holds about individuals, activities, and businesses, unauthorized and unintended access is a clear risk to be mitigated. As IoT devices become more and more proliferated in homes and businesses, the number of vulnerabilities for unauthorized access becomes greater. Collaboration between international cloud IoT providers should be an area of research interest, alongside end-to-end security. Indeed, networking technologies are constantly evolving, and the adoption of new low-power and smaller low-cost IoT devices continues to grow. The interoperability of these embedded devices with legacy systems and other platforms has become a critical research area. There is a distinct lack of industry protocols and standards, which will naturally lead to market growth of fragmented systems and could limit deployment or force obsolescence in the future. Regulation and governance are also important. Regulatory compliance, such as data protection and privacy laws, varies between geographical locations and is subject to change with technological advancements. Therefore, dynamic data governance approaches for IoT are an area of interest, ensuring privacy is upheld and security compliance is monitored and implemented effectively. Long-term, sustainable, and resilient IoT approaches are needed. In terms of social cost-benefit analysis, large-scale deployment of IoT is an area that needs more research effort.
Security and Privacy Concerns
In IoT discussions, perhaps the most highlighted concern is about security and privacy. The connected devices in IoT networks are vulnerable targets for cyberattacks. A real-world example of such a situation is a botnet, which was used to launch multiple DDoS attacks, resulting in congested networks and disrupted services. We have also seen some data breaches that occurred through connected device networks, such as baby monitors. The hacker was able to get involved in the network and view what the baby monitor was broadcasting. User privacy in IoT is a pressing issue, associated with user data collection, storage, sharing, and transference, leading to concerns about how this data is used. The data can be monitored by tracking web browsing history, studying user behavior, and building user profiles based on the collected information. The communications between smart objects and their use of a complex chain of intermediaries present additional security challenges.
The changes in the data as it moves through the IoT network need to be regulated to ensure data integrity, comprehension, and confidentiality throughout the network. Sensitive data needs to be encrypted when transmitted from IoT networks. Necessary regulations to protect user privacy include the requirement for wireless device vendors to implement encryption capabilities and deliver these options in a user-friendly way to prompt users to turn them on. In addition, connecting to IoT devices may result in data protection liability because the handling of personal data is subject to whether data is processed inside or outside the rules of data protection laws. Organizations are responsible for personal data transmitted by the devices and systems of IoT; internal processing of personal data is subject to all data protection prescriptions, particularly regarding the purpose and arrangement, right of compliance, people’s right to access information, and people’s consent. In determining the best approach to protect organizations from IoT and other cyber risks, executives should verify whether the security measures are fit for the relevant IoT, compliant primarily with applicable statutory and regulatory requirements, and reasonably address the company’s security needs.
Interoperability Issues
For the Internet of Things to work properly, the IoT devices should interoperate or communicate with each other. Many IoT devices would be communicating across diverse ecosystems, and a common denominator should exist for them to interoperate. A general absence of standard protocols, data payloads, and communication procedures disrupts the prospects for achieving seamless connectivity and isolates the locations of systems that can function in a device ecosystem. Not having an IoT ecosystem involving different complementary devices and systems connecting with each other makes IoT user-friendly and does not support its growth. One of the most crucial features that may distinguish various interoperability methods is how the exchange of data can be facilitated in a collaborative or competitive environment. Contact within heterogeneous IoT systems and devices calls for some kind of common basis for the exchange of information and decisions. Even though many IoT semantics platforms exist, they do not communicate among themselves because of differing ontologies, toolkits, and working protocols. The biggest hurdle in exchanging knowledge and insights is that we do not have a shared linguistic wisdom platform or common semantics. Proposed strategies to address the challenge of interoperability include creating industry consortiums with an agreement on common communication protocols and interfaces; initiating open-source projects to achieve wide-scale collaboration leveraging the cyber market and the international community; and enforcing regulations dictating IoT producers and suppliers to verify basic security infringement procedures and rights. Irrespective of these obstacles, the growth of generally accepted IoT norms would streamline the compliant and sparse regulations across geographies and augment the ability of both sectors as they might be engaged in combined research and analysis from networks of device clients. Such on-the-ground research might assist in the effective management of the data extracted or needed, as well as the best security protocols to be established. Technologies involving data switches and IoT device analytics will be more robust for a few of the apparent concerns linked to this issue. The number of IoT connections will reach 22 billion. Each of those devices employed within a smart home would incorporate a controller, possessing the capability to not only monitor and control but also interoperate. The rise in such numbers requires distinct and global cooperation to integrate the protocols and mediums of all such functioning devices that operate in different objects, spheres, domains, and operating systems. While the proliferation of emerging IoT devices could become a disrupter of safe living and operations if interoperability is ensured, robust and economical measures can also enable us to experience an informative and secure life.
Current Applications of IoT
The applications of IoT can indeed be witnessed in everyday life, and there is a growing interest among studies in each of these areas. Smart home is one of these areas, where the era has changed to the convenience of life with the presence of connected home devices. There are some electronics companies offering these benefits in consumer electronics. In healthcare, the adoption of IoT technology supports more effective and efficient healthcare services and lowers healthcare costs in the process. Advanced methods on IoT-based healthcare, including the technologies, factors, and implementation cases, are presented through a review study. The aim is to offer well-being to livestock on the farm. Therefore, IoT has been applied in agriculture, especially in animal tracking.
IoT technology is growing little by little through smartphone integration and is ideal for people using advanced wiring. IoT applications can also solve several energy consumption issues. The application of connected devices is extending to other fields as well. A review study on IoT developments has been reported on smart energy, rural initiatives, and efficient parking. The demand for consumer electronics is high. IoT case studies can be considered an objective routing protocol to determine how the agricultural process was performed in previous years. Since wireless technology is broadly concerned, the use of farming equipment is widely used to enhance global positioning system operation routing. In the scenario of smart exercise, many reviews have been carried out, and they are valid for a consumer who can benefit from sports of their interest. In recent years, Internet access has attracted many educators due to the ease of Internet access for the symptoms of compression, making people more intelligent and developing more networks in the project. The features of smart homes can be extended to senior citizens, and their benefits are detailed. They can allow a senior person to learn about the location of an intermediate person and instructions on how to walk through the model wearing object detector assistants. Since the use of wireless systems has developed over the years, it has been used as emergency communication for patients. The construction process of static eye alertness systems, which can reportedly make megapixels available and be digital. Everything can be part of the creation of a small embedded startup network with a virtual server.
Future Trends and Innovations in IoT
The IoT domain has gained notable attention in research by engaging sustainable state-of-the-art technologies, including artificial intelligence, machine learning, and cognitive computing. AI, machine learning, IoT, and big data analytics come together to support a range of smarter systems, processes, services, and applications. In a few years, hundreds of billions of connected things will make lives easier and transform businesses into customer-oriented services. The growth of IoT connections in the future can trigger a set of new applications and use cases in every sector. Some particularly innovative and interesting applications can appear in the fields of transportation, smart cities, agriculture, health, and environmental monitoring. The growth in IoT will also demand increasing energy consumption, which can be reduced by involving smarter energy solutions, resulting in growing support from IoT in achieving potential sustainable development goals. M2M communication and IoT-based sensors communicate among themselves for smart grid operations and leverage demand-side response activities.
One promising approach that will be of paramount importance in decongesting IoT traffic with limited network resources is edge computing, which cooperates with distributed intelligence in building up a faster response space by bringing the computational capabilities close to the data source in order to provide robust performance. The IoT space will also potentially see corporate mergers and acquisitions, and joint ventures to tap into the global demand for IoT utilities. The global regulatory environment will severely shape the demand and adoption of IoT devices and applications. As the devices connect and adopt new technologies, regional market scenarios are likely to evolve. Additionally, the potential underpinning is going to emerge in the IoT domain, facilitated by various entities in terms of regulators, tech companies, and policymakers, supported by the proliferation of tech advancements in supporting pre-COVID applications. It is imperative for the stakeholders to devise adaptive strategies embedded with new regulatory requirements brought about by the Internet of Things to foster innovative technologies in several new commercial applications of interest. The commercial markets are overwhelmed with wireless connectivity and have retained their scale in adopting the Internet of Things for new stories.