Google Executive Vint Cerf: We Need To Recognize Scalability, Reliability And Security Challenges In IoT

Solution providers, developers and manufacturers need to take a more cautious approach to bringing IoT products to market, Google executive Vint Cerf said during a keynote at IEEE World Forum on IoTMonday.

Cerf, Chief Internet Evangelist at Google, stressed that devices coming into the market need to be reliable, secure, interoperable and scalable – but many manufacturers are ignoring these attributes as they rush to get connected products out into the market.

"The industry needs a better sense of responsibility for the safety, security and reliability of the software we write or the systems we make," said Cerf, who is known by many as the founding father of the internet. "Thinking about reliability and ease of use is important – if a device is not reliable, no one will use it."

Vendors need to look at the long-term issues when it comes to IoT products, including how software bugs can be fixed and where customers can go to get new software updates. While many vendors are making IoT models that pair one app with one customer and one device, a lot of manufacturers don't think about the scalability of IoT: "Scaling will be a major challenge in this environment," he said.

Customers also play an important role in pressuring manufacturers to build more secure and reliable connected products, particularly when it comes to getting vendors to play ball with setting standards and protocols on IoT devices so that they are interoperable.

"We need pressure from the buyers of IoT devices when it comes to finding a way to agreements in standardization," said Cerf. "They want to be able to select products from a diverse range of suppliers and still have them work."

The World Forum on IoT is hosted by IEEE, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. The conference runs fromMondaythroughWednesday.