Internet of Things

As the size of devices that access the internet shrink, many new opportunities arise. Products such as Google Home Mini and Alexa are groundbreaking devices that change the way we interact with the internet. Mobile phones are also getting better and smaller. They are starting to think for themselves with Artificial Intelligence. Instead of typing questions we have into a traditional computer or phone internet browser, we are now asking devices things with our voice. Complete purchasing systems are now integrated into Amazons Alexa and anything on the internet is available to buy with a simple voice command. Google Home allows anyone to instantly access the internet to find information about traffic, news, movies, music, and the like. But with such potential also comes great security concerns. It is crucial to keep payments secure and anonymous to protect the privacy and assets of the user. Just in the past few years many companies have fallen to hackers and consequentially lost massive amounts of money. With the massive data breach of the well-known company Yahoo, in 2013 it was estimated that there was a loss of three-hundred and fifty million dollars from Yahoos sale price. Another such data breach impacted the online buying and selling site eBay, and it was estimated that it exposed confidential information of nearly 145 million users. Not only is strong passwords and encryption necessary, but it is also critical that information is transferred and stored securely. When internet encryption first came out, many websites used a standard for storing passwords known as MD5. However, this standard was not fully thought out and was soon cracked and completely insecure. Most all websites are now moving on to encryptions standards such as SHA254 which would take completely unreasonable amounts of time for even the best computers to crack. But that is just the information on the storage side. It is also critical to make sure when buying products online that the websites transfer payment information over protocols secured with SSL. Many people have fallen to the consequences of buying things off non-secure webpages, and that is why is so important that the public should be educated about internet security. Having managed a couple of websites myself, I have seen first hand the effects of not having the proper security built it. Once a website I was working on was compromised by a hacker because the proper SSL was not in place yet. The process of re-securing the website was quite difficult and took up a lot of time that could have been better spent else ware. In closing, the future of internet capable devices is quite bright, but developers should keep a close eye on the aspect of security to prevent future mishaps.