The Internet of Things is Changing the Way Businesses View Online Threats

When you think of the Internet of Things, does your mind immediately wander into the realm of connected devices that change the way we interact with each other? Or, does it consider the security issues that can potentially become a threat to your entire network and technology infrastructure? Hopefully it’s a little of both, with an emphasis placed on security.

As explained by Gartner’s IT glossary, “The Internet of Things (IoT) is the network of physical objects that contain embedded technology to communicate and sense or interact with their internal states or the external environment.” With more devices connecting to the Internet than ever before, concern for the topic of network security is at an all-time high; and considering how these devices are designed to interact with one-another, it’s no wonder why.

The Internet of Things presents a number of challenges to the modern business, but all of them involve some sort of data security concern. Naturally, you want to prepare your business’s network to protect sensitive data and other confidential corporate information. Due to the way The Internet of Things exchanges data and communicates with other devices, protecting this data is no small task. The same protective measures that work against other types of threats aren’t nearly as effective when it comes to the IoT.

According to Brian Partridge of 451 Research, there are a couple of variables that are common throughout the vast amount of different IoT devices: a device, a network, and a cloud service. Furthermore, there are three challenges posed by The Internet of Things that plague IT professionals:

• Confidentiality Challenge: Limiting access to data on a user-by-user basis. For example, the average employee doesn’t need access to your financial records.
• Integrity Challenge: Making sure that data is sent and received securely, without being altered, detected, or stolen while in transit. In other words, this is making sure that your data isn't vulnerable to attack while it’s moving from one system to another.
• Authentication Challenge: Making sure that received data is coming from a legitimate source.

To this end, we highly recommend that you call Heart of Texas Network Consultants for any and all concerns you might have about The Internet of Things and network security. We can equip you with security tools like a Unified Threat Management (UTM) solution, which is designed to take a multilayered approach to keeping your data safe. For more information, give us a call at (254) 848-7100.