Internet of things: Transformation beyond connectivity. 

The IoT is such a hot-button topic today and is taking over the world. It has the potential to impact not only our daily life but also how we work.

This brings you to the fact as to what exactly ‘Internet of Things’ is? What impact is it going to have on you?

There are lots of technical, policy-related conversations and complexities around ‘Internet of Things’ but many of you are still trying to grasp the heck of the conversation. So let’s stick to the basics.

A concept first put forward by Mark Weiser in a 1991 article for Scientific American, it stems from the idea that the continuing trend for reductions in price, size and energy consumption of electronic components, microprocessors and communications modules will lead to a truly ubiquitous computing experience.

Today broadband internet is widely available, cost of connecting is decreasing day by day, more devices are being created with Wi-Fi capabilities and inbuilt sensors, technology costs are going down, penetration of smartphones is sky-rocketing. All these factors are creating perfect ground for IoT.

The term ‘Internet of Things’ was coined by entrepreneur Kevin Ashton, one of the founders of the Auto-ID Centre at MIT. He was the part of the team that discovered how to link objects to the internet.

The concept is basically connecting device with internet. This includes computer, smartphones, watch, headphones, refrigerator, toaster, car, fan, lamp, air conditioner, machines, jet engine of an aeroplane anything you can think of.

Impact on you

In following decades, anything that can be connected, will be connected to the internet.

IoT will take inter-connectivity to a whole new level.

• Smarter homes and offices wills save energy costs or offering better security by constant surveillance and taking proactive action on security breach.

• Better health care via remote monitoring of patients and administering medications to them.

• Smart street lighting or automatic sensing and control of traffic signals.

• Smart automobiles that can assist in control vehicle speed based on traffic and environmental conditions.

The possibility for today and tomorrow is limitless and that’s what everyone is excited about.

IoT allows virtually endless opportunities and also to many challenges. Threat to security and data privacy is a big issue.

With all your devices connected, what can you do to make sure that your information stay secure? Will someone hack your headphone and thereby get access to your entire network? There you’ll have an issue of privacy and data sharing.

This is a hot topic even today, so one can only imagine how the conversation and concerns will escalate when we are talking about many billions of devices being connected. 

For now the best thing that we can do is to educate ourselves about what Internet of Things is and the impacts that can be seen on our daily life and work.