Why security is critical to the success of IoT

By Calum Barnes, Dec. 02, 2015 – The Internet of Things (IoT) has exploded on to both the consumer and business markets in the last few years and is starting to have a major impact in almost every industry. From construction and manufacturing to retail and healthcare. Like it or not, IoT is here to stay.

For businesses, IoT promises to revolutionise everything from inventory management and distribution to sales and marketing.Connected devices help to speed operations and generate actionable data to help gain deeper insights into how consumers are using products and services - increasing the quality of customer support, apply targeted marketing campaigns and hopefully increase customer loyalty and profit.

IDC predicts that by 2017, IoT devices will generate $7.3trillion in revenue.Not surprisingly, this massive market opportunity has many companies eager to bring innovative connected devices to market.The range of available IoT-ready equipment grows daily - from personal health and fitness devices to connected lighting systems to workplace safety monitors - everyone is getting into the IoT game.

It's certainly an exciting time.We are experiencing real innovation and it's generating some serious revenue. Looking beyond the dollar figures, though, a key concern for anyone trying to get into or take advantage of IoT needs to be security. With hacks, breaches and data leaks making headlines on a daily basis, confidence in the security of business technology is low.It's understandable how that scepticism has made its way to the IoT as well.In order for the IoT to live up to all of its potential, we need to get the security strategy right.

The Security Implications of the IoT

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