Let’s clear up the confusion about the Internet of Things definition

You probably heard about the Internet of Things and connected devices, chances are that you’re using your phone to read this blogpost. IoT devices are starting to reshape our habits, but more importantly, they became a must-use component in factories leading to the rise of what experts call the 4th industrial revolution or Industry 4.0.

No problem so far, but the fact is that there’s a big confusion in the definition of “Internet of Things” (IoT).

A lot of experts define IoT as a network “made up of devices — from simple sensors to smartphones and wearables — connected together” as Matthew Evans, the IoT programme head at techUK, said. This definition was picked up by other persons and by the media such as Wired. But, where is the “Internet” part then?

Let’s be honest, the “i” in IoT stands for Internet, right? Technically, the devices can communicate between them without using the internet, furthermore, those devices can connect to the internet without communicating with each other.

As we know, in the mid-80s, researchers created the internet to share data between distant computers. Then we started to connect other kinds of devices to the internet (sensors, ATMs, consumer electronics) and we called it the Internet of Things, explicitly referring to extending the internet communications to various devices.

The problem is that some so-called IoT devices communicate without using the internet, and thus, it raises my actual question: why should we use the word “Internet” to refer to communication that doesn't use the internet?

Well, the question has already been discussed by researchers.

The definition of IoT according to the IEEE P2413 standard is: a network that connects uniquely identifiable things to the internet. Meaning such devices need to have “a global identifier and can be accessed from anywhere, anytime”.

The IEEE P2413 is a joint initiative, which tries to unify the IoT definition. The report explicitly says: “we emphasize that for a system to be considered as an IoT, the “things” so identified have to be connected to the Internet which is a network above an intranet or extranet”. Making IoT definition different from M2M Communication (Machine-to-Machine Communication), and also different from Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) definition; which describes network nodes connected to one (or sometimes several) sensors, without requiring internet connectivity.

Characteristics of an IoT system defined by the IEEE-IoT Initiative

My Bluetooth speakers, smart lamp and connected T-Shirt can only receive data from the smartphone over Bluetooth and do not involve any internet communication at all. Their goal is to send sensors information’ to be displayed by a mobile app, or to receive on/off commands from the phone. And yet, those products are all marketed as IoT devices.

So is “IoT” becoming a marketing argument to sell products? or do we need to constantly review our definitions as customers to not be misled by the ideas received from some advertisers?

I will leave the question open, meanwhile in the next blogpost I will discuss what I call the “smart device” marketing argument: Are smart devices really smart? What is ‘smartness’ and what is the different between smart devices and intelligent devices?

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