IoT Security: What Smart Devices Mean for Your Privacy

IoT Security for Smart Devices

IoT Security for your privacy and what you can do about it. As you wake up in the morning, your alarm clock tells you the weather, recites the to-do list you wrote last night, and reads a few emails off your smartphone.

The smartwatch you’re wearing shows you a graph of your sleep cycle. With the push of a button on an app, your coffee pot starts brewing a fresh cup.

In your morning rush, you forget to lock the front door! Not to worry: with another app, you can automatically secure your home and watch your front porch right from the office.

A few decades ago, this scene would have seemed like something out of a sci-fi novel. These days, however, it’s just everyday life – all thanks to the Internet of Things (IoT).

Our hyper-connected world has made our lives faster and more convenient. However, some IoT critics claim that all our “smart” devices take away our security and privacy. Moreover, leaving us vulnerable to bad actors like hackers, thieves, and even greedy corporations.

Is the IoT putting our privacy at risk?

What can we do to protect ourselves – and our stuff?

What is the Internet of Things?

While the term “internet of things” was officially coined in 1999, the concept of smart devices has been around since the early 1980s. The first “smart” device was installed back in 1982: an internet-connected vending machine a Carnegie Mellon University that could report its inventory back to the manufacturer.

Since that time (particularly over the past two decades) the IoT security has exploded, with a new smart product hitting the market nearly every week.

Wearable devices that track our vital signs, home appliances that tell us which groceries we need to buy, home security systems that project video to our phones and computers – it seems like the possibilities are endless.

As companies create new products, people everywhere are gobbling them up. It is estimated that 20 billion IoT devices will be running by 2021, enough for every person on the planet to own 2.6 items!

Smart Devices and Your Security

It is certainly true that smart devices are useful, efficient, and ultra-cool – but the IoT can also have its drawbacks.

The biggest problem is a lack of user information; while most folks today know how to install antivirus software on their computers, many fail to realize that any smart device could be a target of cyberattacks.

The reality is this: any device that connects to the internet is vulnerable to hacking. Folks can access your fridge, your microwave, or even your baby monitor to learn about you and steal your information.

And once a device in your home is compromised, you might wind up suffering from problems like identity theft and ransomware attacks (an event where a hacker locks you out of your own devices until you pay them).

Of course, there’s no guarantee that your devices will be hacked by an internet troll. But it is a near-guarantee that your smart devices are collecting information about you.

Household devices like the Amazon Echo or Google Home are considered “always-on” devices. Moreover, they are designed to listen for trigger words that allow them to record and process commands from users.

See Also: Amazon Alexa – A globally paid Spy

Unfortunately, this system is still in its infancy and misheard triggers have resulted in many families’ private conversations being recorded.

What You Can Do

Ultimately, all our smart devices carry some risk of a security breach from both hackers and the manufacturers themselves.

This thought can be unsettling to many – unsettling enough to make some want to give up on the IoT entirely. However, it doesn’t have to be that way! Here are a few tips to help keep your smart devices secure.

Encrypt Your Wi-Fi [ IoT Security ]

Your wi-fi network is essentially the front door to all your IoT products. Once a cybercriminal accesses your wi-fi network, he or she will be able to access any devices using that network.

For this reason, it’s critically important that you protect your “front door”. The best ways to do this are with a strong wi-fi password and an encryption method like WPA2.

Disable Unnecessary Features [ IoT Security ]

Smart devices are designed to be as helpful as possible. That means many of them have extra features you don’t need. For example, many smart home devices have a “remote access” option, so you can use them via apps on your phone.

However, that remote access means that anyone on your network could use your devices! If your device has any feature you don’t plan to use, make sure you disable it quickly.

Update Your Software [ IoT Security ]

How often have you gotten a software update notification on your computer, but opted to push “remind me later”? We all do it from time to time, but out-of-date software can put our computers at even greater risk over time.

Make sure you update your IoT device software whenever you get that alert. So you always have the newest software and the latest IoT security options.

Another professional solution would involve you looking into getting a set of complex and real-time analytics to handle your data needs.

As this need to adopt modern data infrastructure is quickly becoming mainstream, you will want to invest in a system like this: https://imply.io/post/an-end-to-end-streaming-analytics-stack-for-syslog-data