Taming of the Wild: IoT in Public Spaces

The progression of wireless communication into lower power, smaller form factor devices has heralded the age of the Internet of Things (IoT). Predictions show the integration of IoT devices into all facets of our public and private lives. It is not hard to imagine an IoT-enabled home that allows a user to interact with their personal environment or an IoT-enhanced store that advertises available products, enhanced with targeted offers to nearby or frequent shoppers. However, there are many dangers inherent in the use of IoT in public spaces, including violations of a user's privacy and overwhelming the limited bandwidth in dense IoT deployments. Challenges lie at all layers of the IoT ecosystem and privacy must ultimately be built into the devices and protocols we use.