The Internet of Things refers to the Internet working with “connected devices” and “smart devices”, plus buildings and other items, for the purposes of collecting and exchanging data. For the consumer, it is the cusp of the wearable device expansion and the moves to develop the so-called “smart home.”
This means any device with an on-off switch to the Internet forms part of the rapidly expanding Internet of Things, ranging from cellphones, coffee makers, washing machines, headphones, lamps, wearable devices and so on. It is estimated that by 2020 there will be over 26 billion connected devices.
Two research institutions have come together to assess what the Internet of Things means for the search engine. The bodies are University of Surrey’s Institute of Communication Systems (U.K.) and the Ohio Center of Excellence in Knowledge Enabled Computing at Wright State University (U.S.)
For search engines to adapt, the report argues that there is an urgent need to develop new search solutions. This is to allow information from connected devices to be found and extracted. Existing search engines, while effective at locating text-based data, are limited in their ability to locate the types and formats of numerical and sensory data generated by smart devices.
For this to happen there will be a decreased reliance upon human initiated searches and a greater amount of machine-to-machine searches. Such searches will need to be automatically generated, and to alter based on location, preferences and local information.
As an example, driverless cars (or ‘autonomous vehicles’) will need to seamlessly access data relating to traffic and weather information from multiple sources. There will not be the time for a human to be involved in this process.
To achieve this, search engines will require modifications to ensure there are efficient methods for indexing, crawling and finding data. It will also be important to have the data safe from hackers. Bridging the gasps between social, physical and cyber data, however, will not be straightforward.
The findings are published in the journal IEEE Intelligent Systems. The paper is headed “On Searching the Internet of Things: Requirements and Challenges.”
