The Internet of Things (IoT) denotes everything connected to the internet including billions of physical devices worldwide embedded with sensors, software or other technologies that collect and share data about the environment that surrounds them. In simple words, IoT is the concept of connecting any device to the internet or other connected devices.
IoT helps people live and work smarter and gain control over their lives. These devices range from household objects to sophisticated industrial tools. A coherent communication between people, processes or things can happen by connecting kitchen appliances, thermostats, refrigerators or baby monitors to the internet via embedded devices.
How is the data shared?
IoT provides the common platform for all those devices to use their data and a common language for all the devices to communicate with each other. Data is emitted from various sensors and sent to IoT platform security. IoT platform integrates the collected data from various sources, further analysis is performed on the data and valuable information is extracted as per requirement. In the end, the data is shared with the other devices for a better user experience, automation or improved efficiency.
How does IoT work?
IoT devices can be divided in general and sensing devices. The general devices are the main components of the data hub and the information they exchange. They are connected even by wired or wireless interfaces. The sensing devices on the other hand include sensors or actuators. They measure the temperature, humidity or light intensity. These IoT devices are connected to the internet with the help of gateways. These gateways process the information collected from the sensors and transfer it to the cloud. The cloud acts as both the storage and processing unit. Actions are executed on the collected data for further learning and inferences. Wired and wireless interfaces like wi-fi, Bluetooth, GSM gateway and so on are used to provide connectivity to ensure its ubiquity. Applications needs to support a diverse set of devices protocols from tiny sensors capable of sensing and reporting the desired factor to powerful backend servers that are utilized for data analysis and knowledge extraction.
How does IoT benefit us?
IoT is transforming our lifestyle and transforming the way we interact with technologies. There are smart appliances, smart cars, smart homes or smart cities. Vehicles or barcode sensors, traffic lights and almost everything that you come across in day-to-day life can be connected with these sensors. Then, these sensors emit data in a continuous way to show the working state of the devices. The user can get detailed insight into the working of devices around him. Basic objects or things have the ability to sense the surroundings to interact and collaborate with one another. For example, a lightbulb may be switched on using a smartphone app. If you forgot to turn off the air conditioner at home then you could use your smartphone to turn off the air conditioner from whenever you are. If your alarm goes off, the IoT system can turn on the coffee pot for you or even turn on the water heater for you. Also, there are projects used on cities by attaching sensors to control and analyze data across environment which may be: traffic, water, crowd control, transit, lightening, waste management, security and parking.
Today, a lot of industries can benefit from IoT. These industries include: retail, health care, manufacturing, transportation or general safety. In the retail industry it can help to monitor automatically what items are running low or needed. In transportation, ships, cars or trucks can change their route based on weather conditions or check the temperature for some specific products etc.
Overall, the idea of IoT is to attach sensors and intelligence to inanimate objects and make peoples live easier. It can be assumed that almost everything in the future is going to be automated and connected to the internet. According to Business Insider, IoT industry will experience a growth of over 2.4$ trillion dollars annually and that there will be more than 41 billion IoT connected devices by 2027. This follows a lot of job opportunities in the IT field. Check the link here for a better understanding of IoT.
