The Internet of Things (IoT) merges the digital and physical worlds with wi-fi connected home security, speakers, cars, factories, and pretty much anything else people use to make the world go ‘round.
Today’s society isn’t so much obsessed with convenience as much as they’re used to it. So, IoT is a natural next step in a world that demands immediacy and efficiency.
But the tech has a few snags that providers must address before IoT can integrate fully. Execs at McKinsey explored those snags in a recent report.
The most significant of all? Cybersecurity.
Indeed, IoT systems present higher risk profiles than enterprise IT that make them vulnerable to hacking.
Do people care? Absolutely.
While it’s true that people love speed and convenience — but not at the expense of security and privacy. McKinsey found that only 30% of IoT providers think “digital trust” is critical for IoT. This is a stark contrast with the 60% of buyers who find digital trust critical to adopt IoT. Similarly, 61% of IoT buyers rank privacy as critical, compared to the mere 47% of providers who agree.
Leading analyst and founder of Intellyx Jason Bloomberg reminds us why IoT users are hung up on privacy and security. After all, IoT’s business model doesn’t care about the songs you tell your speaker to play or the frequency at which you drive to work. Bloomberg cautions in this Wired article that IoT’s business is big data, which is about people’s patterns:
“The value in Big Data…are in the patterns. What apps you use. Which ads influence your buying behaviour. The more Big Data they [IoT providers] collect, the more they know about how you behave. And once they know how you behave, they know how to control how you behave.”
IoT providers need to converge IoT functionalities with cybersecurity to move forward. McKinsey notes that this includes:
- Data privacy
- Access under confidentiality
- Reliability
- Compliance under integrity
- Uptime
- Resilience under availability
But achieving this demands participation from many players. Here’s how McKinsey sees IoT overcoming these cybersecurity challenges:
More regulation: Currently, buyers and providers don’t have any contractual agreements that protect data or privacy. McKinsey suggests more “rigorous regulatory compliance models” to manage cyber threats and ensure accountability.
Architectural cybersecurity: IoT providers should build secured code into software — firmware and hardware, too.
Parallel-design cybersecurity and collaboration: Cybersecurity providers and IoT providers can work together in the design process to ensure alignment. Fortunately, this is already happening, with 60% of IoT providers partnering with external cybersecurity partners for support when they can’t manage it adequately in-house.
Software add-on availability: IoT providers can fashion solutions receptive to cybersecurity add-ons installations, post-product completion.
If IoT providers accomplish all that? McKinsey sees a future with a “fully integrated network and seamless industrial and consumer experience.” But most importantly? An unlocked gravy train offering between $125 to $250 billion in additional value for IoT suppliers
Read the full McKinsey article.
