Posted by Hemanth Kumar Yamjala

The Internet of Things is one of the technologies making yesterday’s science fiction the reality of today. It will act as a force multiplier for digitization and can potentially transform the world into a smart one - smart cities, smart vehicles, smart manufacturing, smart homes, and many others. According to IDC, spending on IoT by businesses and other entities is going to surpass $1 trillion in 2023. Further, out of the projected connected devices of 29 billion, around 18 billion are expected to be related to IoT. And the data generated by these devices will be to the tune of 73.1 zettabytes by 2025.

In other words, ignoring the penetration of IoT across domains and not investing in its vast sweep could be detrimental to the competitiveness of business enterprises in the future. Even though the IoT will continue on its upward trajectory in use cases and device numbers, enterprises should take into account the challenges related to interoperability and security. Let us discuss the top IoT predictions that IoT testing services, or for that matter, the CIOs of enterprises, should acknowledge and incorporate in their value chain.

Top IoT Forecasts for CIOs to Recognize

As a smart technology, the Internet of Things is going to change the landscape of the digital world. The top IoT forecasts for the years to come are mentioned below:

# AI-based IoT data analysis: With IoT being adopted as a frontline technology by most organizations, there will be a need to gather, store, process, and analyze huge amounts of data generated by it. This is where AI-based data analysis will take over from traditional analysis wherein data mined by IoT devices will be analyzed for known patterns to draw insights about various aspects of an organization. AI is going to be applied to a host of IoT-generated data in the form of still images, video, speech, text, and network traffic activities. This should drive the CIOs of business enterprises to implement the necessary skills and tools to leverage AI in their IoT testing approach.

# IoT with legal, social, and ethical dimensions: With the increased adoption of IoT across business segments, a wide range of social, ethical, and legal issues may come to the fore. These may include privacy, regulatory compliance, algorithmic bias, and ownership of data, among others. In fact, the success of any IoT solution should not be based on its technical prowess or effectiveness alone, but on social acceptability as well. Hence, CIOs should review their corporate strategy, IoT and AI systems, and key algorithms by external agencies for any potential bias. In doing so, they may include external IoT testing services to not only validate the technical aspects of such systems but their social, ethical, and legal dimensions as well.

# Data broking and infonomics: According to a Gartner survey, businesses are going to include the buying and selling of IoT data as an essential part of their strategy. As per the theory of infonomics, the monetization of IoT data will be treated as a strategic asset by businesses and included in their accounts. CIOs should educate their staff on the opportunities and risks pertaining to data broking and set the appropriate IT policies, including incorporating mandatory IoT testingin the value chain.

# Transition from Intelligent Edge to Intelligent Mesh: The transition from cloud to edge architectures in the IoT space is underway and is likely to give way to a more unstructured architecture in the form of a dynamic mesh. The mesh architectures will lead to more intelligent, responsive, and flexible IoT systems, but with additional complexities. As a result, CIOs must prepare their organisations for the impact of mesh architectures on IoT systems. Consequently, the focus of the Internet of Things QA testing should be to ensure every aspect of the IoT and mesh architecture performs as desired.

# IoT Governance: With the expansion of the IoT space, a proper setup for governance, including an IoT testing framework, should be instituted. This is to ensure appropriate behavior in the generation, storage, deletion, and usage of IoT-related data. IoT governance would entail device audits, control of devices, firmware updates, and the usage of information delivered, among others. CIOs must educate their organizations on issues related to IoT governance.

Conclusion 

The Internet of Things will continue to expand and play an important role for business enterprises in areas such as data mining, analysis, and management, decision-making, privacy, security, and others. CIOs must make their enteprises ready to leverage the opportunities offered by the IoT as well as set up proper architectures, including IoT security testing, to mitigate any associated risks.