Approach towards application of commercial off-the-shelf Internet of Things devices in the military domain

Battlefield environments are evolving and presenting new challenges for the military all around the world. This is pushing the necessity for evolution of military sensor technologies at an unprecedented rate. While military contractors and manufacturers are coming up with newer and improved technologies, the commercial domain is growing at a much faster rate. It is high time that the military introduces the use of Commercial off-the-Shelf (COTS) sensors due their inherent advantages. In this paper, we present an approach towards using the COTS Internet of Things (IOT) sensors for sensing and surveillance on Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs) which form a part of a convoy. The data gathered is processed and distributed between the UGVs, over the convoy vehicles and to higher echelons using existing military communication framework extended by the MIOT architecture. The data distribution on the ground between the UGVs and convoy vehicles is carried out using the NATO Generic Vehicle Architecture (NGVA). The publishing of consolidated and processed data from the ground to the higher echelons like command centres is carried out using the Multilateral Interoperability Programme (MIP) specification.