Opinion Archives

Opinion

Has the IoT Standards Train Already Left the Station?

December 1, 2014 Paul Roberts

The Harvard Business Review has an interesting blog post from last week that looks at the effort to develop standards and promote RFID (Radio Frequency ID), a kind of Ur-technology for our current Internet of Things. Writing on the HBR blog, Thomas Davenport and Sanjay Sarma note that the effort to develop RFID standards, led by MIT’s Auto-ID Labs, provides a possible model for the development of cross-vendor standards for the Internet of Things. However, the authors caution that it may already be too late to achieve consensus on standards to govern Internet of Things communications, given the heavy investment of large and wealthy technology companies in the standards process. One of the most successful elements of the RFID standards effort, which developed and promoted the EPCGlobal standard, was close collaboration between academics, technology vendors and end users.End users of the RFID technology – notably retailer WalMart, Procter & Gamble and […]

Wellness Apps & Wearables Put You up for Sale | SANS Institute

December 1, 2014 Paul Roberts

The SANS Institute’s Securing the Human blog has a nice, contributed article by Kelli Tarala of Enclave Security on the security and privacy implications of wearable technology. Among Tarala’s conclusions: health and so-called “quantified self” products do much more than gather health data like pulse and blood pressure. Rather: they are omnivores, gobbling up all manner of metadata from users that can be used to buttress health data. That includes who you exercise with, favorite walking- and jogging routes and the times you prefer to work out. Of course, social media activity is also subject to monitoring by these health apps, which often integrate with platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest to share workout information. [Read more Security Ledger coverage of wearable technology here.] All of this could spell trouble for consumers. To quote Tarala: “there are companies interested in your Quantified Self, but their goals may not be to health related.” […]

Security Needs Context in IoT| SC Magazine

November 24, 2014 Paul Roberts

SC Magazine has a worthy editorial on IoT and security by John Barco, VP of product management at the firm ForgeRock on how Internet of Things (IoT) technologies requires both security and a better understanding of what Barco calls “context.” “It’s not just about protecting IoT devices but the entire ecosystem, from the customer to the partner, the web page, mobile device, mobile app, the cloud and everything else in between,” he writes. Organizations that do not grasp the complex interactions between static devices, mobile devices and (of course) the cloud risk leaving sensitive, regulated data or intellectual property at the mercy of malicious actors. Barco’s recommendations? More and better user authentication to support IoT use cases outside the firewall, and future-proofing your IoT deployment by eschewing proprietary platforms and technologies. To quote Barco: “open source gives IT a platform it can build on and customize, while open standards offer the flexibility to adapt to future […]

Strategies for Securing Agile Development: An Online Conversation

November 19, 2014 Paul Roberts

There’s no question that agile development methods, which emphasize collaboration and shorter, iterative development cycles, are ascendant. Many factors contribute to agile’s growing popularity, from constrained budgets to increased user demands for features and accountability. Though traditionally associated with small and nimble software and services startups, agile methodology has been embraced by organizations across industry verticals – many (like John Deere) whose name doesn’t scream “app store” or “Silicon Valley Startup.” But if agile is here to stay, a nagging question is how to pivot to agile’s fast-paced and iterative release schedules without skimping on important areas like code security. After all, the conventional wisdom is that security slows things down: imposing time- and labor intensive code audits and testing on the otherwise results-driven development cycle. Fortunately, agile and secure development aren’t mutually exclusive. Tomorrow (Thursday), the Security Ledger and Veracode will collaborate on a Hangout and discussion of how to build, automate and deliver secure software using the agile […]

Biggest Threat to Critical Infrastructure? Lack of Imagination

November 18, 2014 Paul Roberts

The threats to critical infrastructure in the U.S. and elsewhere are so plentiful that even trying to enumerate them is futile (and not a bit depressing). But – if we were to rank them in order of importance – what would be at the top of that list? Clearly, as this blog has noted, software security is a major concern. Recently, the Industrial Control System CERT (ICS-CERT) warned about a sophisticated malware campaign targeting users of HMI (human-machine-interface) technology from leading vendors. In at least some cases, the systems targeted were exposed directly to the Internet, making compromise simple. In other cases, industrial control system software is deployed with default administrator credentials, or easy to guess passwords. In other words: while some attackers are persistent and clever, many critical infrastructure owners make their job pretty easy. So, perhaps, its not software insecurity that belongs at the top of the list, […]