The growth of the IoT is rapidly accelerating. Across the industry, market forecasts are nearly universally positive, with a number of research papers predicting that the IoT will be worth several trillion dollars and contain tens of billions of connected devices by 2020.
Yet this growth cannot be sustained unless consumers and businesses are confident that the privacy and security of their data does not become compromised. Over the last twelve months, there have been media stories of high profile hacks and security breaches exposing a potential threat to the growth of the IoT. Serious breaches have occurred across multiple sectors, including automotive and health, which threaten to damage confidence in the entire IoT.
Such breaches could be regarded as characteristic of an industry in its infancy, but as more IoT services and devices are introduced to the network, the more pressing the need will be for industry-wide adoption of stringent security requirements.
The security of connected devices in a scalable network depends on all stakeholders working together to gain an understanding common threats and following a unified approach to security. Such an approach would be the quickest and most likely route to a secure IoT, and would demonstrate the industry’s capacity for self-regulation.
Mobile network operators are taking a leading role in securing the IoT, with the GSMA having produced an initial draft of its ‘IoT Security Guidelines’, designed to help the industry establish a common understanding of security issues, establish best practise and provide recommendations on how to mitigate common security threats and weaknesses.
We are now pleased to invite industry experts to review this set of documents and make any comments or suggested changes to ensure it reflects the requirements of the nascent IoT security space. To download the guidelines and provide feedback, please visit the GSMA IoT Security Guidelines page. Submissions must be made by November 16.