What Kind of Security Threats Are Most Exposed By IoT

The battle for greater security in the age of the Internet of Things will take place on two fronts: personal security, and corporate/industrial security.

On the professional front, with the coming of the Internet of Things, every company becomes a technology company. Right now, a coffee shop has to keep their Wifi password safe so that only customers can use their free Internet. When everything from the espresso machine to the paper towel dispenser is hooked up to the Internet, hackers will have that many more access points at which to attack the store.

It’s easy to imagine that popular targets for hackers might include vending machines and any other devices with access to credit card information, because it’s all eCommerce now. Beefing up security measures on all fronts is going to become that much more important.

On the personal front, the fear of hackers going after someone’s pacemaker or using a laptop to hijack somebody’s Google Car may seem a little overblown, but they’re not completely without reason. To put the Internet of Things simply, it’s anything-to-anything connectivity.

The good news is that it will be very hard to take control of devices via hacking, and there isn’t much to gain from it. More likely, hackers will be looking at devices that know credit card number and trying to obtain records and data from them.

Strong passwords and antivirus software will remain relevant. The only real difference is that users will need to change the password to their car as frequently as they change the password to their email.