Internet of Things - Pros and Cons

Like everything else, the Internet of Things has both good qualities and bad qualities. 

At a first glance, it looks almost foolproof; what could be wrong with being able to connect to everything just from your phone? An IoT user will be getting a lot of things out this. They will be able to better secure their house; they will be able to monitor just about anything in their house (kids, temperature, etc...) by using an app most, smart vehicles will make traveling and commuting safer, manufacturing will be improved significantly, and many other benefits.

All these good things come at a price though. The Internet of Things is facing some security challenges. All the existing security issues that come with the internet and mobile devices are added to the new list of issues that come with the IoT. Data loss and data theft are at the top of the list. If a hacker were to ever gain access to one of the devices on your IoT network, your data would be compromised. They would have access to anything and everything that is correctly connected to that specific network. The more devices on the IoT network, the greater the probability is of a hacker gaining access.

Every application needs to be updated every now and then. Most updates are minor things or security updates. We all know that with every update comes a new set of issues, especially in a big application (a POS system for example). While the updates are meant to fix a lot of things, they also invite all sorts of new problems. With IoT, the constant updating will bring newer and newer security risks while attempting to fix the previous ones.

Final Verdict?

I personally would like to see where IoT is going. It's definitely a good idea but I don't know if I would risk my personal information just to be able to control everything I own from my phone. I'm not one for losing things, but if I ever lost my phone or whatever I use to keep up with my IoT devices, I would be at a loss. Depending on who found my device, my network could potentially be at risk and in today's world that is not a good thing. I'll stick with what we have now and wait to see where IoT is going.