Information technology has been critical to the exponential growth of the Internet of Things. This is because IT has led to the emergence of new emerging technologies, algorithms, protocols, and applications. The development of better infrastructure was able to facilitate the rapid adoption of wireless communication trends. This, in turn, led to devices that are powerful, smart, cheap, small, and easier to deploy and install. These devices are able to communicate with each other and also connect to the internet or the cloud. The development of IoT through IT has underwritten technological advancement in critical aspects such as the transportation sector, smart homes, healthcare, agriculture, and even retail. Although the development of IoT offers numerous advantages such as accessibility, connectivity, and easier communication, it also offers numerous privacy and security threats. This is because security features within IoT are not well defined. Also, the internet is ever-evolving, and this always leads to new threats and vulnerabilities. Additionally, privacy laws on the IoT are weak and consequently are not able to ensure the privacy of data. Information technology has been critical to the development of the IoT, and the current privacy laws on the IoT are weak and are not able to ensure privacy and security of data for users.
Areas of Interest
The growth of information technology all over the world has been essential in the growth and development of the internet of things or IoT. The world, as we know it, is characterized by physical objects in the home, the mobile and industrial domain being changed from isolated sources to devices that have internet connectivity and that can communicate with other devices and the cloud (Information Technology Industry Council, 2020). This describes the Internet of Things. The advancements in information technology have resulted in the manufacture of intelligent devices that can be applied to different aspects of our everyday lives, such as the transportation sector, smart homes, healthcare, agriculture, and even retail. Advancement in information technology has the potential to revolutionize previously standalone systems into integrated networks that leverage better data analytics, and computer capabilities to increase productivity and efficiencies, create jobs, and address significant societal challenges 1 . IT has been critical in the growth of IoT, which presents numerous benefits and applications to different areas of society.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
The rapid development of the IoT has led to numerous security and privacy issues, and the current privacy laws are not effective enough to ensure data security and privacy in IoT. Even though the widespread development of IoT offers different benefits that have the capacity to help people conduct their everyday business, IoT also presents a number of concerns about security vulnerabilities (Patel & Patel, 2016). Advancement in information technology has resulted in new threats and vulnerabilities that seek to violate people's privacy through hacking or eavesdropping and surveillance. Aside from these, most of the average consumers who utilize the internet of things are concerned about her or his privacy. In order to cope with these threats, stakeholders in the IT sector must look to develop sterner privacy laws that will ensure privacy in the IoT. The current privacy laws that are in place are not able to ensure privacy and data security in IoT. This creates the need to focus on the privacy concerns in the IoT and look at how privacy laws can be shaped in order to ensure data privacy and data security.
Research Findings
The growth of the ICT sector has enabled people to control their everyday activities and behaviors. ICT has also developed into the central part of human life with vital infrastructure offering interconnection of assorted devices in various aspects (Abdul-Qawy et al., 2015). ICT has been essential in the development of the IoT, which is a critical living entity. Owing to the fact that the internet is ever-evolving, it has resulted in new emerging technologies, algorithms, protocols, and applications. The rapid adoption of wireless communication trends has created an ever-growing innovation in connectivity to the internet and cellular broadband. As a consequence, communication devices that lack infrastructure have become universal, connectible, powerful, smart, cheaper, smaller, and easier to deploy and install (Abdul-Qawy et al., 2015). These components advanced by ICT have laid the groundwork for the widespread adoption of IoT all over the globe. Information technology has played a crucial role in the development of the internet of things.
The Internet of things describes the technological wave that looks to integrate technology into our surroundings and our daily lives. Information technology has been critical in the development of IoT. IoT is often referred to as the network of physical objects 2 . In the past, the internet was merely the network of computers; however, it has evolved to become the network for devices of different sizes and types; home appliances, smartphones, vehicles, animals, medical instruments, toys, industrial equipment, buildings, and people who are all connected. The different objects in the IoT are able to communicate with one another. They are able to share data based on the specified protocols in order to attain smart restructurings, safe and control, positioning, locating, online upgrade, safe control, process control and administration, and even private real-time online surveillance (Patel & Patel, 2016). The development of IoT has enabled people to integrate technology into our surroundings and our everyday lives.
The development of the IoT has resulted in numerous security threats that undermine the data of millions of people across the world. The Internet of Things has facilitated interaction, communication, and information sharing between millions of devices across the world. Devices connected to the IoT undermine the basic standard of privacy: the ability to distinguish and separate context in data as people choose (Internet Society, 2019). This is particularly essential in the case of wearable and home IoT devices for the strong assumption of privacy we relate with the context of the body and home. The invasive nature of the Internet of Things makes it extremely difficult to ensure the privacy and security of personal data (Psychoula et al., 2018). The invasive nature of the IoT is caused by devices collecting and using personal data of people in order to tailor the service they provide to every user. Studies indicate that these data collection procedures will become more powerful in the future to the point that the devices will be collecting personal data from the users without permission (Psychoula et al., 2018). The ability of IoT devices to collect data from users and share them via the internet has raised privacy and security issues.
Current privacy laws have proved to be ineffective in ensuring the privacy and security of data in the IoT. As the IoT devices continue to increase, companies and other corporate bodies are unable to ensure data privacy and security. This is because IoT creates new security threats that application developers and device manufacturers were not expecting (Maras, 2015). In addition to this, IoT devices enable storage, appraisal, surveillance, and sharing of large volumes of data with other networked users and devices. Because of a lack of privacy law on IoT, the users' privacy is threatened since there is restricted choice and regulation over the collection, storage, and distribution of their data (Maras, 2015). The threat of an insufficient legal structure on IoT privacy necessitates urgent attention in legal appraisal and may also demand new strategies in legislation.
Proposed Solutions
IoT presents numerous security and privacy concerns that must be addressed. If these security concerns are not addressed in the IoT devices, then product liability and class action lawsuit may be brought forward against the manufacturers of these devices by affected users (Maras, 2015). Aside from this, other stakeholders in IoT devices, such as application developers, may also be liable to legal action. One way of addressing privacy concerns in IoT is through developing IoT devices that are resilient to cyber-attacks. This can be accomplished by implementing control access systems to ensure that only authorized personnel are able to access the devices (Maras, 2015). Aside from this, manufacturers must also look to create strong authentication measures in order to protect IoT devices from unauthorized entry. Manufactures can include aspects such as security safeguards into IoT devices as additional security measures. In other IoT devices such as clinical devices, manufacturers can remove backdoor accounts and replace them with firmware that is only signed in digitally. This will offer an extra layer of protection that ensures privacy in IoT. Aside from this, there is a need for legislative changes. Lawmakers must compel IoT device manufacturers to make IoT safer through improved security measures. Having stricter laws will help to ensure that IoT device manufacturers go the extra mile in order to ensure the security of their devices.
Conclusions
Information technology has been critical to the development of the internet of things because it facilitated the establishment of critical infrastructure that is employed by IoT devices. The internet of things has offered a number of critical advantages, including accessibility, connectivity, and easier communication. However, IoT is also associated with a number of privacy and security issues, such as cyber-attacks. The Internet of things has an invasive nature, and this has made it extremely difficult to ensure data security and privacy. Additionally, the current privacy laws on the IoT are weak and are not able to ensure the privacy and security of data for users. In order to ensure privacy in IoT, legislative bodies must pass stricter laws that compel IoT device manufacturers to ensure privacy in their devices. IoT device manufacturers can implement control access, develop stronger authentication measures, include security safeguard, and remove backdoor accounts and replace them with firmware that allow users log in digitally in other devices. Employing these approaches will help make IoT more secure.
References
Abdul-Qawy, A. S., Pramod, P. J., Magesh, E., & Srinivasulu, T. (2015). The Internet of Things (IoT): An Overview. International Journal of Engineering Research and Applications, 1(5), 71-82.
Information Technology Industry Council. (2020). Internet of Things. Retrieved from https://www.itic.org/policy/internet-of-things
Internet Society. (2019). Policy Brief: IoT Privacy for Policymakers. Retrieved from https://www.internetsociety.org/policybriefs/iot-privacy-for-policymakers/
Maras, M. H. (2015). Internet of Things: Security and privacy implications. International Data Privacy Law, 5(2), 99.
Patel, K. K., & Patel, S. M. (2016). Internet of things-IOT: definition, characteristics, architecture, enabling technologies, application & future challenges. International journal of engineering science and computing, 6(5).
Psychoula, I., Singh, D., Chen, L., Chen, F., Holzinger, A., & Ning, H. (2018, October). Users' Privacy Concerns in IoT Based Applications. In 2018 IEEE SmartWorld, Ubiquitous Intelligence & Computing, Advanced & Trusted Computing, Scalable Computing & Communications, Cloud & Big Data Computing, Internet of People, and Smart City Innovation (SmartWorld/SCALCOM/UIC/ATC/CBDCom/IOP/SCI) (pp. 1887-1894). IEEE.
1 Information Technology Industry Council. (2020). Internet of Things.
2 Patel & Patel. (2016). Internet of things-IOT: definition, characteristics, architecture, enabling technologies, application & future challenges. pp.6122
