The world is adding more and more connected devices by the minute. The IoT sector is expected to grow to over 20 billion devices by 2020. As a direct result, businesses are expected to spend $134 billion annually by 2022 on cybersecurity alone for IoT devices. This is according to a recent Juniper Research report. What is concerning is that with the approximately 8.4 billion IoT devices already connected today, we are having difficultly preempting attacks. The major reason for this is the inherent security vulnerabilities in older devices. So while government bodies and tech industry players are addressing this for new products, it’s legacy end point devices that are seemingly most vulnerable. What to do now? If you are an IoT administrator, you should take inventory immediately of all your connected end points and determine what you should protect right away.
There’s a running joke regarding connected gadgets and the internet of things: “The ‘S’ in IoT stands for security.”
And yes, I’m aware there’s no “S” in IoT.