Monday, December 23, 2019

Oh Good, A Secure IoT Standard At Long Bloody Last, Kind Of... Sort Of... Maybe...

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I'll believe it when I see it. 
Don't count your horses just yet. ;-)


Meanwhile, read with hope in your heart:

The IoT wars are over, maybe? Amazon, Apple, Google give up on smart-home domination dreams, agree to develop common standards
The bad news: You may have to buy all new kit if you want things to work
By Kieren McCarthy in San Francisco 18 Dec 2019 at 19:41
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/12/18/iot_standards_war/
After years of trying and failing to dominate the smart home market with their own standards, tech giants Amazon, Apple and Google have finally agreed to work on a set of common code that will allow smart home products, from thermostats to cameras to plugs to digital assistants, to work together seamlessly. 
The new “Connected Home over IP” approach will be developed through a new working group within smart home veteran organization the Zigbee Alliance, and the broad brush blueprint of the new standard is stark in its obviousness. It will be an IP-based protocol so it can connect directly to the internet rather than require a hub; it will be open-source and royalty-free and allow for end-to-end secure communication; and it will work with core standards like Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. 
The new standard should emerge in draft form in late 2020, meaning that 2021 will be the start of a new era in smart home tech, where Alexa talks to Nest and you can have a single app on your phone to talk to everything else....
OK!
But wait!
What about...?

Microsoft built its own custom Linux OS to secure IoT devices
https://thehackernews.com/2018/04/microsoft-azure-sphere-iot-linux.html

AND

FIDO Alliance looks to create standards for internet of things devices
https://www.cnet.com/g00/news/fido-alliance-looks-to-create-standards-for-internet-of-things-devices/

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