Crypto Academy Season 4: Week 1 – Blockchain and Internet of Things – by @yohan2on

Question No. 1 - Explain why the future Internet of Things depends on Blockchain.

The term internet of things (IoT) and how it will change the way we live has been one of the most talked about topics in recent times. IoT is simply the ability for man-made things or devices to talk to each other and interact with other by themselves in a specialized internet-based system. It is a new technology that is tipped to go beyond human to human interaction, and extend it to machine to machine, device to device interaction. Before the idea and concept of IoT became reality, it was not possible for “things” to interact with each other. With IoT, this is now possible, a clear example being smart homes, fully automated factories that handle all the processes from start to finish without any human input. It is now possible for devices to interact with one another, send data and receive data by themselves without any human input. Almost anything can be used in the world of IoT.

For instance, a smart hand bracelet can have sensors that tracks and records how many hours someone sleeps in a day and uses that data to send data signals to other devices to perform certain actions like switch on all the lights and turn on the coffee maker when someone wakes up from sleep. Or a smart shoe that tracks and record number of steps someone makes in a day and if a particular count is reached, it sends data signals to another device to perform an action, and much more. This is the tip of the iceberg. A whole city can run on IoT. The power of the IoT is endless and there are no boundaries to which what IoT can accomplish.

Internet of Things (IoT) and Why its Future depends on Blockchain

The internet has been around for a long time now and till date remains one of the most transformative inventions created by mankind, a technology that has changed the world and the way we live. Prior to the internet of things, the internet was all about connecting humans and allowing humans to interact with one another without being in a physical location. However, the internet of things has changed that as not only is it possible for humans to humans to interact using the internet, objects and man-made things can also interact with each other. Before I delve into discussing why the future of IoT depends on Blockchain, it is important to first discuss some of the challenges that might hinder the growth and adoption of IoT.

Some Challenges that Might Hinder the Growth and Adoption of IoT

While the concept of IoT is an interesting one, it is also something that has raised a lot of concerns as well. There have been a lot of concerns concerning the future of IoT as is has shown to have a number of problems and challenges that could hinder its growth and adoption. There are a number of notable challenges that might hinder the growth and adoption of internet of things technology which are;

• Problem of loss of data because of single point of failure due to data being stored on centralized servers. This can be a big problem for IoT because all the data being stored on centralized servers can fail, causing loss of data which might not be recoverable.

• Security problems is also another problem that faces IoT. IoT runs on centralized systems which can be a point of target for hackers to hack their way into the system to steal vital information and data. Also, anything that is stored on centralized servers stand a high risk of hack. Hackers are becoming more and more advanced and can find a loophole to hack and steal vital information and data which can be used for malicious activities.

• Privacy problems is also another major problem that faces IoT. IoT is all about transferring data from one IoT device to another in real-time. Some information and data are meant be private and not seen by any third party. The sending and receiving data between IoT devices that run on centralized servers can suffer from lack of privacy because the data that is transferred can be breached or hackers can expose those data for malicious activities.

• High maintenance cost is also another challenge that faces IoT. Due to the heavy data on centralized servers that are processing and storing large data, the cost of maintenance increases drastically. As more and more IoT devices are sending and receiving data, the workload on the servers increases which requires more capacity to store and handle huge data.

• Alteration of stored data is another major problem that faces IoT. Some IoT devices handles sensitive information or data, like in the financial institution or government institution etc. These data can be altered by highly technical hackers. This has become a big concern for the adoption and growth of IoT.

How Blockchain Technology Solves Some of the Challenges that Faces IoT

• Immunity to data loss is one of the main benefits of blockchain. Blockchain technology is decentralized which means that there is no single point of failure as there are many nodes that are connected to each other. Even if one node fails, there are other nodes that holds the network.

• Better Security is another solution that blockchain technology brings to IoT. Blockchain is a very secure technology that is very difficult for hackers to hack. Blockchain uses advanced encryption methods to secure the network which makes it extremely difficult to be hacked. Also, miners and validators secure the network by validating transactions and adding new block on the blockchain.

• Privacy is one of the benefits of blockchain technology. In blockchain, there are encryption methods that are used to secure the network and provide privacy to data. With this, any data and information that is sent and received can be encrypted and would need the correct key to be decrypted.

• Immutability of data is another solution to the that blockchain technology provides for IoT. One of the main problems of IoT is that data that is stored on centralized servers can be altered. With blockchain technology, IoT devices can send and receive data and the data will be Immutable.

• Cost reduction is also another is another solution of blockchain technology to solve high cost issues relating to IoT and centralized servers. Blockchain technology helps reduces the cost since the workload is carried out by decentralized nodes in the network.

• Transparency - One of the characteristics of Blockchain technology is that it allows for transparency. One of the issues of IoT is that there is a possibility of data manipulation due to centralized entities. Blockchain solves this because certain data and details are transparent and available for anyone to have access to, meaning that manipulation will be impossible.

Question No. 2 - Research and create content on the following IoT Blockchain use case

Filament

Filament is one of the top projects in IoT and are providing solutions to the internet of things by combining the power of blockchain technology and building hardware and software solutions. The Filament project was founded in 2012 with the sole aim of solving some of the challenges that faces IoT and providing solutions to enterprises and IoT. The Blocklet Foundation Kit was developed and launched by Filament to give users ability generate IoT transactions on blockchain and demonstrate smart contracts functions.

The Blocklet Foundation Kit provides the base for embedded developers to demonstrate how IoT can utilize blockchain technology so as to enable IoT devices to connect to one another securely. The concept of internet of things is still very much early and with projects like Filament looking to make IoT better by utilizing blockchain technology, it helps eliminate the challenges hindering growth and adoption of IoT.

Filament are providing hardware and software solutions that helps brings improvement to IoT and how IoT ingrates with blockchain technology. Filament aims to use blockchain technology to mitigate the challenges that face the current IoT state, the main problems being data loss, security, privacy, cost, transparency, centralized control, manipulation of data and more. By providing solutions to these main challenges to the current IoT, it will foster the growth and adoption of IoT and how IoT devices interact with one another.

Filament has created a Blocklet microchip as a hardware solution to improve the capabilities when integrated to IoT hardware. Blocklet is also one of the solutions of filament to improve the data security in IoT devices. The DLT ecosystem is another solution by filament created as an enhanced cybersecurity protocol for Internet of things devices. This protocol allows IoT devices to interact with one another securely.

Conclusion

Blockchain and the internet of things are two terms that have raised a lot of talking points over the past few years. Blockchain technology has been around for a few years now and at the moment, we are already seeing the massive growth of blockchain technology and how it is constantly gaining adoption all over the world. When it comes to blockchain, it is simply a digital immutable and distributed ledger which processes and records data through decentralization. Internet of things (IoT) is one of the popular terms in recent times and has become even more popular in this modern era of the internet and blockchain technology. While IoT isn’t perfect and has its own challenges, projects like Filament are there to provide both hardware and software solutions to help mitigate the challenges facing IoT growth and adoption.