The Trusted Cloud and IoT Innovation Activity is a new platform and solution that empowers Internet of Things (IoT) users to share information between their devices and the cloud seamlessly and flexibly – from home consumer devices to smart cars, cities and industries. It gives users control over their device-generated data, all the way from data collection and acquisition to in-cloud analysis and back.
Gartner has predicted that as soon as 2020 there could be 20 billion Internet of Things devices generating trillions of dollars' worth of business value*. These devices include multiple types of “things” such as radio-frequency identification (RFID) devices, electricity usage meters and cameras. The IoT has the potential to positively disrupt many areas including healthcare, the automotive industry, home appliances and "industry 4.0", in which manufacturing relies on automation and data exchange.
“The Trusted Cloud and IoT will provide a unique governance solution taking sensor readings and managing user access rights, delegation rules, and open decision factors to control Internet of Things environments. The solution’s configurable and flexible middleware will be based on cutting-edge research technologies for dynamic, continuous data control,” explains Innovation Activity leader Géry Ducatel.
“Unlike existing, competing solutions, the Trusted Could and IoT platform and solution cover use cases including home, healthcare, the automotive sector and industry 4.0 verticals," continues Ducatel. "The solution comes with a compliance and governance paradigm based on Attribute Based Access Control (ABAC) technology. Furthermore, the fact that this is a joint project of several partners, all leaders in their fields, who have strong experience of working together and sharing information with each other, is a great boost to our product development.”
The solution will include the capability to access policies on the IoT and mobile devices. As they are based on the ABAC paradigm and incorporate immutable attributes, the policies can be designed at any level of complexity and granularity. Thus, access conditions can map onto complex and dynamic contexts.
The demand for secure IoT platforms with secure network management and governance will be driven by domestic consumers as well as large IoT platforms. With this in mind, the Trusted Cloud and IoT will address the three growing markets of Network Access Management, Network Function Virtualisation, and IoT.
A startup will be launched to sell the solution and platform. It will operate on a Business-to-Business-to-Consumer (B2B2C) model and will be looking to orchestrate security and compliance for industrial partners and customers. Partners of the Innovation Activity will provide their out-of-the-box security innovations for securing IoT devices.
The selected Business-to-Business verticals are smart home application and service providers, e-health monitoring application providers, organisations from the automotive industry and Industry 4.0 solution providers – all having end customers wanting to rest assured that their data is produced, stored, and used in a safe and secure manner across all platforms on cloud, mobile or IoT devices. The new startup will make use of the positive brand assets of the Innovation Activity’s partners to drive sales.
Background
Trusted Cloud & IoT is one of EIT Digital’s 10 Digital Infrastructure Action Line Innovation Activities of 2018. The Digital Infrastructure Action Line focuses on enabling digital transformation by providing secure, robust, responsive, and intelligent communications and computation facilities for markets.
The leader of the Trusted Cloud & IoT Innovation Activity is the UK's BT Group, which has key responsibilities for LDAP technology and integration. The other EIT Digital partners taking part in the Innovation Activity are Italy's National Research Council – CNR (responsible for startup creation and unified computing system technology), the leading Italian consulting, systems integration and digital services company Reply (responsible for security by design, cybersecurity management, fraud management and managed network security) and Huawei Technologies (responsible for cloud data protection, hybrid cloud, secure boot and enclave encryption, object storage and Infrastructure as a Service).
*Gartner Newsroom: Gartner Says 8.4 Billion Connected "Things" Will Be in Use in 2017, Up 31 Percent From 2016
See also Juniper Research: IOT connections to grow 140% to hit 50 billion by 2020, as EDGE computing accelerates ROI
