to cyber-attack. The loss, theft, and exposure of private information become common today due to network interconnectivity. The IoT system must be capable to safeguard from pilferage or leakage of sensitive information by taking preventive measures. This way, it can avoid unwanted threats to national, environmental, social, and personal entities by providing smart security with efficient IoT gateways [16]. It requires the provision of password protection systems, ciphering or cryptographic or jumbling technologies, robust routing mechanism. The security clearance is a must at every level to maintain information integrity, confidentiality, authenticity.
Smart homes: The IoT-based smart homes help the end-users to cope and deal with their busy schedules by interlinking the sensors, electronic gadgets, etc. with software set up in homes [13]. The equipment such as the computer, mobile phone, air conditioner, lighting, heating mechanism, ventilation, security systems, hardware, etc. connected through networking and sensors benefit from these ends irrespective of time and place.
Smart vehicles: The IoT-based smart transport system equipped with smart servers can provide e-notification, traffic and weather updates, automated accident detection, etc. to drivers and vehicle owners to save up on their energy and time. It helps to restrict the vehicle speed under adverse weather condition and traffic congestion by estimating the distance traveled the driver reaction time, etc. The associated systems such as the GPRS tracking, emergency prioritization, vehicles, GSM modem, infrared proximity sensors, Xbee, embedded processor are few contributions of smart vehicle systems [12]. Similarly, smart vehicles that can handle and inform human affective states can provide a warning to a passenger or the driver for timely action by alerting the traffic management system in case of emergency [17].
Smart campus: The resources are scarce and are rapidly depleting with an increase in the global population, hence they are limited. Further, it is not advisable to neglect the environmental effect.
Climate change, soil erosion, global warming, acid rain, etc. in the exploration of resources on a large scale. It demands awareness among the consumers, manufacturers, designers, service providers, to develop energy-efficient IoT system for smart cities. In this regard the role of NGOs, educational institutions, think tanks, intellectuals remain vital to promoting green residences or campuses. This can be possible by providing automatic monitoring and control of IoT devices focusing on the economy, energy-efficient, reliability, etc. [18].
1.3.2 The IoT Software Domain
A few of the IoT Software domains are shown in Figure 1.3 and have been explained briefly here.
1.3.2.1 IoT in Cloud Computing (CC)
CC aims to deliver the hardware and software services across a parallel and distributed system. It has three important characteristics such as (a) virtual, (b) dynamic provision on-demand, and (c) negotiation. In this scheme, the hardware and software systems are interconnected dynamically and computerized virtually [19]. This way, the scheme reduces the carbon footprints and emissions besides decreasing the energy consumption appreciably. This can be achieved by transferring a few on-premises applications into the cloud. One of the real-life situations where CC finds its use is on-line marketing in which we procure goods and services without our presence in the shop-floor physically. Further, it reduces unnecessary expenditure on transportation and reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by each individual going to the shop-floor separately. As it is possible in CC to use the resources of the service provider rather than buying expensive equipment or systems for a business, it is economical. The reduction in the cost of using CC may be attributed to the following.
One can include new software, hardware, and system upgrade costs in his/her contract.
The expert data is found in the cloud, thus need to hire or pay the expert staff.
Thus, it reduces energy consumption.
Unnecessary time delays can be avoided.
Some of the other benefits that are offered by CC are security, flexibility, insight, quality control, increased collaboration, disaster recovery, competitive edge, loss prevention, sustainability, etc. The major advantages of CC have been shown in Figure 1.4.
The limitations of CC are briefed below.
Privacy agreement: The user in the CC platform requires the desired privacy and service level agreement before the commencement of the services. It delegates certain responsibilities on both the service provider and the user which needs to be adhered to by both the parties.
Security: The protection of data and the security against pilferage, theft, etc. need to be considered beforehand. While it is provided by the service provider in its periphery, the remote users need to weigh the security system before opting for CC.Figure 1.3 Softwarebased IoT applications.Figure 1.4 The benefits of CC.
Vulnerability: Since each component is easily accessible via the internet, it is likely to be attacked by hackers.
Limited flexibility and control: The uses in CC have limited control over the execution and function of the service provider as per the agreement signed by both parties.
Platform dependencies: The vendor lock-in or implicit dependency creates deep-rooted differences between the user and the service providers. This sometimes poses difficulties for users to migrate to other service providers at will due to additional cost, security, and privacy issues.
Cost: for small businesses or on a small scale, CC cost exceeds the cost due to staffing or hardware procurement.
Types of CC
The commonly employed CC services are briefed below.
Infrastructure as a service (IaS): In this, an external service provider facilitates the user with computer power and disc space via the internet. The users need to have hardware such as CPU, data storage, memory, or network connectivity. Examples of IaS are the Rackspace, Amazon EC2, Windows Azure, etc.
Software as a service (SaS): In this, the user can access the internet-hosted software by browsing. The service provider maintains and controls the software updates and the user has limited control over the configuration settings and the applications. It is mostly suitable for small businesses.
Platform as a service (PaS): It is a crossover between SaS and Ias. In this case, the user rents the operating system, hardware, network capacity, storage, etc. to the service provider. Thus, the user has the desired control over the computing setup, technical aspects, customization, etc. as per his/her need.
1.3.2.2 IoT in Edge Computing (EC)
CC is an efficient mechanism to process the data that reduces at the network edge. New software domains have been developed that are more energy-efficient than CC are the Fog or EC [20, 21]. In EC the computation of the enabling technologies is carried out at the edge of the network. At downstream data, this function is performed using cloud services whereas, at upstream data, the IoT services are carried out.
In EC, the network resources are managed and controlled between the path of cloud data found useful in
