THE INTERNET OF THINGS: AN OVERVIEW Understanding the Issues and Challenges of a More Connected World OCTOBER 2015 COLOUR PRINT VERSION THE INTERNET OF THINGS: AN OVERVIEW Understanding the Issues and Challenges of a More Connected World Karen Rose, Scott Eldridge, Lyman Chapin OCTOBER 2015 COLOUR PRINT VERSION © 2015 The Internet Society (ISOC). This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution/NonCommercial/ShareAlike 4.0 Unported license. CONTENTS Executive Summary................................................................................................................................ 4 Introduction.......................................................................................................................................................... 8 WHAT IS THE INTERNET OF THINGS? 11 Origins, Drivers and Applications................................................................................ 12 Different Definitions, Similar Concepts............................................................. 16 Internet of Things Communications Models.............................................. 18 Device-To-Device Communications 18 Device-To-Cloud Communications 19 Device-to-Gateway Model 20 Back-End Data-Sharing Model 22 Internet of Things Communications Models Summary 23 WHAT ISSUES ARE RAISED BY THE INTERNET OF THINGS? 27 Security Issues............................................................................................................................................. 31 The IoT Security Challenge 32 A Spectrum of Security Considerations 33 Unique Security Challenges of IoT Devices 34 IoT Security Questions 35 Privacy Considerations................................................................................................................. 39 Internet of Things Privacy Background 40 Unique Privacy Aspects of Internet of Things 41 IoT Privacy Questions 42 2 Interoperability/ Standards Issues........