Internet of Things
Everyday objects with network connections, from thermostats and light bulbs to industrial sensors, notorious for weak security, dependence on vendor clouds, and devices that outlive the companies supporting them.
The Internet of Things (IoT) is the extension of network connections to ordinary physical objects: thermostats, light bulbs, locks, doorbells, appliances, and industrial sensors. Kevin Ashton coined the phrase in 1999 while promoting radio tags for supply chains. The idea is older: in 1982 students at Carnegie Mellon connected a soda machine to the ARPANET to check whether it was stocked and cold, and a Cambridge coffee pot had a webcam pointed at it from 1991.
Devices are cheap, small, and often battery powered, which shapes their networking. Some use Wi-Fi directly. Others use low-power radios, such as Bluetooth mesh, that relay through one another and reach the internet through a hub. Lightweight messaging protocols such as MQTT let a sensor report a reading in a few bytes. The Matter standard, launched in 2022 by the major platform companies, aims to let any certified device work with any assistant or hub.
Security has been the persistent problem. Devices ship with default passwords, run Firmware that is rarely or never updated, and are built by manufacturers competing on price. In 2016 the Mirai malware scanned the internet for cameras and routers still using about sixty common factory logins, assembled hundreds of thousands into a botnet, and used it in a denial-of-service attack on the DNS provider Dyn, making major websites unreachable for parts of a day. A running joke holds that the S in IoT stands for security. The United Kingdom banned universal default passwords on consumer devices in 2024. Standard advice is to put such devices on a separate network segment with no route to anything important; see Least Privilege.
Most consumer devices also depend on their maker's servers. Because home networks sit behind address translation, devices typically keep an outbound connection open to a vendor cloud, and the phone app talks to the cloud rather than to the device. When the company drops support or shuts down, the device can stop working: in 2016 a smart home hub called Revolv was switched off remotely after its maker was acquired. Owners have pushed back, favoring devices with local control and backing Right to Repair; see Planned Obsolescence.
Privacy concerns follow from the sensors. Microphones in speakers, cameras in doorbells, and usage logs from meters and appliances reveal when people are home and what they do; see Personal Data.
The early vision of computing that disappears into the environment is still the appeal. Done well, connected devices stay quiet until needed and work without an app. Done badly, a light switch needs a firmware update and an internet connection.
See also2
Serial Port
The old, simple connection that sends data one bit at a time, inherited from teleprinters and modems, gone from consumer computers but still the last-resort console for servers, network gear, and embedded boards.
Systems & Tooling10 connections
Port Scanning
Probing a machine's network ports to find which services are listening, the first step of both attacks and audits, now done to the entire internet in minutes, so anything exposed gets found.
Networks & Distribution9 connections
Linked from5
- Denial-of-Service AttackNetworks & Distribution
Making a service unavailable by overwhelming it with traffic or expensive requests, usually from many machines at once, and the layered defenses that absorb or filter the flood.
- MQTTNetworks & Distribution
A lightweight publish-subscribe protocol in which devices send small messages to topics on a central broker, the common language of sensors, smart homes, and industrial telemetry.
- Planned ObsolescenceMeaning & Society
designing or marketing a product for a shorter useful life than it could otherwise have.
- Port ScanningNetworks & Distribution
Probing a machine's network ports to find which services are listening, the first step of both attacks and audits, now done to the entire internet in minutes, so anything exposed gets found.
- Serial PortSystems & Tooling
The old, simple connection that sends data one bit at a time, inherited from teleprinters and modems, gone from consumer computers but still the last-resort console for servers, network gear, and embedded boards.