Introduction to Internet of Things(IOT) 22ETC15H

Module-1
BASICS OF NETWORKING
1.1 Introduction
Internet of Things (IoT) means a network of physical things sending, receiving, or
communicating information using the internet or other communication technologies and
network just as the computers, tablets and mobiles do, and thus enabling the monitoring,
coordinating or controlling processes across the internet or another data network. (Raj
Kamal)
The purpose of IoT can be visualized using the following examples.
An umbrella can be made to function like a living entity using IoT. By installing a tiny
embedded device, which can interact with a web based weather service and the devices
owner through the Internet the following communication can take place. The umbrella,
embedded with a circuit for the purpose of computing and communication connects to the
Internet. Websites regularly publishes the weather report. The umbrella receives these reports
each morning, analyses the data and issues reminders to the owner at intermittent intervals
around his/her office-going time. The reminders can be distinguished using differently
coloured LED flashes such as red LED flashes for hot and sunny days, yellow flashes for
rainy days. A reminder can be sent to the owner's mobile at a pre-set time before leaving for
office using NFC, Bluetooth or SMS technologies. The message can be—(i) protect yourself
from rain. It is going to rain. Don't forget to carry the umbrella; (ii) Protect yourself from the
sun. It is going to be hot and sunny. Don't forget to carry the umbrella. The owner can decide
to carry or not to carry the umbrella using the Internet connected umbrella.
Streetlights in a city can be made to function like living entities through sensing and
computing using tiny embedded devices that communicate and interact with a central control-
and-command station through the Internet. Assume that each light in a group of 32
streetlights comprises a sensing, computing and communication circuit. Each group connects
to a group-controller (or coordinator) through Bluetooth or ZigBee. Each controller further
connects to the central command-and-control station through the Internet. The station
receives information about each streetlight in each group in the city at periodic intervals. The
information received is related to the functioning of the 32 lights, the faulty lights, about the
presence or absence of traffic in group vicinity, and about the ambient conditions, whether
cloudy, dark or normal daylight. The station remotely programs the group controllers, which
automatically take an appropriate action as per the conditions of traffic and light levels. It
also directs remedial actions in case a fault develops in a light at a specific Location. Thus,
each group in the city is controlled by the 'Internet of streetlights’.
Current era is of data and information-centric operations. Right from agriculture to military
operations depend on the information. The quality of any particular information and speed at
which data is updated to all members of a team (which may be a group of individuals, an
organization, or a country) dictates the advantage that the team has over others in generating
useful information from the gathered data. In the present-day global scale of operations of
various organizations or militaries of various countries, the speed and nature of genuine
information are critical in maintaining an edge over others in the same area. To sum it up,

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today’s world relies heavily on data and networking, which allows for the instant availability
of information from anywhere on the earth at any moment.
Networking implies linking of computers and communication network devices (also referred
to as hosts), which are interconnected through Internet or Intranet. These devices are
separated by unique device identifiers (Internet protocol, IP addresses and media access
control, MAC addresses). These hosts may be connected by a single path or through multiple
paths for sending and receiving data. The data transferred between the hosts may be text,
images, or videos, which are typically in the form of binary bit streams.

1.2 Network Types

Computer networks are classified based on,
1) Type of connection
2) Physical topology
3) Reach of the network.
1.2.1 Types of Connection
Depending on the way a host communicates with other hosts, computer networks are of two
types, (i) Point-to-point and (ii) Point-to-multipoint.
(i) Point-to-point: Point-to-point connections are used to establish direct connections between
two hosts. Day-to-day systems such as a remote control for an air conditioner or television is
a point to point connection, where the connection has the whole channel dedicated to it only.
These networks were designed to work over duplex links and are functional for both
synchronous as well as asynchronous systems. Regarding computer networks, point to point
connections find usage for specific purposes such as in optical networks.
(ii) Point-to-multipoint: In a point-to-multipoint connection, more than two hosts share the
same link. This type of configuration is similar to the one-to-many connection type. Point-to-
multipoint connections find popular use in wireless networks and IP telephony. The channel
is shared between the various hosts, either spatially (three dimensional) or temporally (time
based). One common scheme of spatial sharing of the channel is frequency division multiple
access (FDMA). Temporal sharing of channels include approaches such as time division
multiple access (TDMA). Each of the spectral and temporal sharing approaches has various
schemes and protocols for channel sharing in point-to-multipoint networks. Point-to-
multipoint connections find popular use in present-day networks, especially while enabling
communication between a massive numbers of connected devices. Fig. 1 illustrates the
network types based on types of connection.
1.2.2 Physical topology
Subjected to the physical manner in which communication paths between the hosts are
connected, computer networks are classified into four broad topologies called Star, Mesh,
Bus, and Ring.

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Fig. 1 Network types based on connection types

(i) Star: In this type of topology, a central controller or hub is linked point-to-point to every
host. However, there is no direct communication between the hosts; they can communicate
only through the central hub. The hub acts as the network traffic exchange. For large-scale
systems, the hub should be a powerful server to handle all the simultaneous traffic flowing
through it. There are fewer links involved in this topology (only one link per host), and hence
is cheaper and easier to set up. The main advantages of the star topology are easy installation
and the ease of fault identification within the network. The failure of a host does not affect the
working of the central hub and network. However, if the hub fails, the whole network fails.

Fig. 2 Star Topology

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(ii) Mesh: In this topology, every host is connected to every other host using a dedicated link
(in a point-to-point manner). For ‘n’ hosts in a mesh, there are a total of n(n 1)/2 dedicated
full duplex links between the hosts. This massive number of links makes the mesh topology
expensive. However, it offers certain specific advantages over other topologies. The first
significant advantage is the robustness and resilience of the system. Even if a link is down or
broken, the network is still fully functional as there remain other pathways for the traffic to
flow through. The second advantage is the security and privacy of the traffic as the data is
only seen by the intended recipients and not by all members of the network. The third
advantage is the reduced data load on a single host, as every host in this network takes care of
its traffic load. However, owing to the complexities in forming physical connections between
devices and the cost of establishing these links, mesh networks are used very selectively, such
as in backbone networks.

Fig. 3 Mesh Topology

(iii) Bus: A bus topology follows the point-to-multipoint connection. A backbone cable or
bus serves as the primary traffic pathway between the hosts. The hosts are connected to the
main bus employing drop lines or taps. The main advantage of this topology is the ease of
installation. However, there is a restriction on the length of the bus and the number of hosts
that can be simultaneously connected to the bus due to signal loss over the extended bus. The
bus topology has a simple cabling procedure in which a single bus (backbone cable) can be
used for an organization. Multiple drop lines and taps can be used to connect various hosts to
the bus, making installation very easy and cheap. However, the main drawback of this
topology is the difficulty in fault identification within the network.
(iv) Ring: A ring topology works on the principle of a point-to-point connection. Here, each
host is configured to have a dedicated point-to-point connection with its two immediate
neighbouring hosts on either side of it through repeaters at each host. The repetition of this
system forms a ring. The repeaters at each host capture the incoming signal intended for other
hosts, regenerates the bit stream, and passes it onto the next repeater. Fault identification and
set up of the ring topology is quite simple and straightforward. However, the main
disadvantage of this system is the high probability of a single point of failure. If even one
repeater fails, the whole network goes down.

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Fig. 4 Bus Topology

Fig. 5 Ring Topology

The Table 1 illustrates the features of various network topologies.
Table 1 Comparison between Network topologies

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1.2.3 Network reachability

Based on network reachability computer networks are divided into four categories: personal
area networks, local area networks, wide area networks, and metropolitan area networks.
(i) Personal Area Networks (PAN): PANs, are restricted to individual usage. Wireless
headphones, wireless speakers, laptops, smartphones, wireless keyboards, wireless mouse,
and printers within a house are few examples of PANs. Generally, PANs are wireless
networks, which make use of low-range and low-power technologies such as Bluetooth. The
reachability of PANs is limited to the range of a few centimetres to a few metres.
(ii) Local Area Networks (LAN): A LAN is a group of hosts connected to a single network
through wired or wireless connections. LANs are normally restricted to buildings,
organizations, or campuses. LAN constitutes few leased lines connected to the Internet which
provide web service to the whole organization or a campus. These lines are further
redistributed to multiple hosts within the LAN enabling hosts. The number of hosts is much
more than the actual direct lines of the Internet to access the web from within the
organization. This enables the organization to define control policies for web access within its
hierarchy. The data access rates within the LANs lie in the range of 100 Mbps to 1000 Mbps,
with very high fault-tolerance levels. The network components commonly used in a LAN are
servers, hubs, routers, switches, terminals, and computers.
(iii) Wide Area Networks (WAN): WANs usually connect diverse geographic locations. But
they are restricted within the boundaries of a state or country. The data rate of WANs is in the
order of a fraction of LAN’s data rate. Typically, WANs connecting two LANs or MANs
may use public switched telephone networks (PSTNs) or satellite-based links. WANs tend to
have more errors and noise during transmission due to the long transmission ranges, and are
very costly to maintain. The fault tolerance of WANs are also generally low.
(iv) Metropolitan Area Networks (MAN): The reachability of a MAN lies between that of a
LAN and a WAN. Typically, MANs connect various organizations or buildings within a
given geographic location or city. An excellent example of a MAN is an Internet service
provider (ISP) supplying Internet connectivity to various organizations within a city. As
MANs are costly, they may not be owned by individuals or even single organizations.
Typical networking devices/components in MANs are modems and cables. MANs tend to
have moderate fault tolerance levels.

1.3 Layered Network Models

The internal communication among hosts in either a large-scale or a small-scale computer
network is built upon the premise of various task-specific layers. The open systems
interconnection developed by the International Organization of Standardization (ISO-OSI)
reference model and the Internet protocol suite are the two widely used and accepted
traditional layered network models.
1.3.1 OSI Model
The ISO-OSI model is a conceptual framework that partitions any networked communication
device into seven layers of abstraction, each performing distinct tasks based on the
underlying technology and internal structure of the hosts. These seven layers, from bottom-

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up, are as follows: 1) Physical layer, 2) Data link layer, 3) Network layer, 4) Transport layer,
5) Session layer, 6) Presentation layer, and 7) Application layer.
The major highlights of each of these layers are explained in this section.
(i) Physical Layer: This is layer 1 of the OSI model, which is also known as media layer. The
electrical and mechanical operations of the host are performed by the physical layer. These
operations include or deal with issues relating to signal generation, signal transfer, voltages,
the layout of cables, physical port layout, line impedances, and signal loss. This layer is
responsible for the topological layout of the network (star, mesh, bus, or ring),
communication mode (simplex, duplex, full duplex), and bit rate control operations. The
protocol data unit associated with this layer is referred to as a symbol.
(ii) Data Link Layer: This is layer 2 of the OSI model and called the media layer. The data
link layer is mainly concerned with the establishment and termination of the connection
between two hosts, and the detection and correction of errors during communication between
two or more connected hosts. IEEE 802 divides the OSI layer 2 further into two sub-layers
[2]: Medium access control (MAC) and logical link control (LLC). MAC is responsible for
access control and permissions for connecting networked devices; whereas LLC is mainly
tasked with error checking, flow control, and frame synchronization. The protocol data unit
associated with this layer is referred to as a frame.
(iii) Network Layer: This layer is a media layer and layer 3 of the OSI model. It provides a
means of routing data to various hosts connected to different networks through logical paths
called virtual circuits. These logical paths may pass through other intermediate hosts (nodes)
before reaching the actual destination host. The primary tasks of this layer include
addressing, sequencing of packets, congestion control, error handling, and Internetworking.
The protocol data unit associated with this layer is referred to as a packet.
(iv) Transport Layer: This is layer 4 of the OSI model and is a host layer. The transport layer
is tasked with end-to-end error recovery and flow control to achieve a transparent transfer of
data between hosts. This layer is responsible for keeping track of acknowledgments during
variable-length data transfer between hosts. In case of loss of data, or when no
acknowledgment is received, the transport layer ensures that the particular erroneous data
segment is re-sent to the receiving host. The protocol data unit associated with this layer is
referred to as a segment or datagram.
(v) Session Layer: This is the OSI model’s layer 5 and is a host layer. It is responsible for
establishing, controlling, and terminating of communication between networked hosts. The
session layer sees full utilization during operations such as remote procedure calls and remote
sessions. The protocol data unit associated with this layer is referred to as data.
(vi) Presentation Layer: This layer is a host layer and layer 6 of the OSI model. It is mainly
responsible for data format conversions and encryption tasks such that the syntactic
compatibility of the data is maintained across the network, for which it is also referred to as
the syntax layer. The protocol data unit associated with this layer is referred to as data.
(vii) Application Layer: This is layer 7 of the OSI model and is a host layer. It is directly
accessible by an end-user through software APIs (application program interfaces) and
terminals. Applications such as file transfers, FTP (file transfer protocol), e-mails, and other

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such operations are initiated from this layer. The application layer deals with user
authentication, identification of communication hosts, quality of service, and privacy. The
protocol data unit associated with this layer is referred to as data.
A networked communication between two hosts following the OSI model is shown in Figure
6. Table 2 summarizes the OSI layers and their features, where PDU stands for protocol data
unit.

Fig. 6 Networked communication between two hosts following the OSI model
Table 2 Summary of the OSI layers and their features

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1.3.2 Internet protocol suite

The Internet protocol suite is another conceptual framework that provides ease of
understanding and development of communication and networked systems on the Internet.
However, the Internet protocol suite predates the OSI model and provides only four levels of
abstraction: 1) Link layer, 2) Internet layer, 3) transport layer, and 4) application layer. This
collection of protocols is commonly referred to as the TCP/IP protocol suite as the foundation
technologies of this suite are transmission control protocol (TCP) and Internet protocol (IP).
The TCP/IP protocol suite comprises the following four layers:
(i) Link Layer: The first and base layer of the TCP/IP protocol suite is also known as the
network interface layer. This layer is synonymous with the collective physical and data link
layer of the OSI model. It enables the transmission of TCP/IP packets over the physical
medium. According to its design principles, the link layer is independent of the medium in
use, frame format, and network access, enabling it to be used with a wide range of
technologies such as the Ethernet, wireless LAN, and the asynchronous transfer mode
(ATM).
(ii) Internet Layer: Layer 2 of the TCP/IP protocol suite is somewhat synonymous to the
network layer of the OSI model. It is responsible for addressing, address translation, data
packaging, data disassembly and assembly, routing, and packet delivery tracking operations.
Some core protocols associated with this layer are address resolution protocol (ARP), Internet
protocol (IP), Internet control message protocol (ICMP), and Internet group management
protocol (IGMP). Traditionally, this layer was built upon IPv4, which is gradually shifting to
IPv6, enabling the accommodation of a much more significant number of addresses and
security measures.
(iii) Transport Layer: Layer 3 of the TCP/IP protocol suite is functionally synonymous with
the transport layer of the OSI model. This layer is tasked with the functions of error control,
flow control, congestion control, segmentation, and addressing in an end-to-end manner; it is
also independent of the underlying network. Transmission control protocol (TCP) and user
datagram protocol (UDP) are the core protocols upon which this layer is built, which in turn
enables it to have the choice of providing connection-oriented or connectionless services
between two or more hosts or networked devices.
(iv) Application Layer: The functionalities of the application layer, layer 4, of the TCP/IP
protocol suite are synonymous with the collective functionalities of the OSI model’s session,
presentation, and application layers. This layer enables an end-user to access the services of
the underlying layers and defines the protocols for the transfer of data. Hypertext transfer
protocol (HTTP), file transfer protocol (FTP), simple mail transfer protocol (SMTP), domain
name system (DNS), routing information protocol (RIP), and simple network management
protocol (SNMP) are some of the core protocols associated with this layer. A networked
communication between two hosts following the TCP/IP model is shown in Figure 7.

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Fig. 7 Networked communication between two hosts following the TCP/IP suite

1.4 Emergence of IoT

1.4.1 Introduction
The modern-day advent of network-connected devices has given rise to the popular paradigm
of the Internet of Things (IoT). Each second, the present-day Internet allows massively
heterogeneous traffic through it. This network traffic consists of images, videos, music,
speech, text, numbers, binary codes, machine status, banking messages, data from sensors
and actuators, healthcare data, data from vehicles, home automation system status and control
messages, military communications, and many more. This huge variety of data is generated
from a massive number of connected devices, which may be directly connected to the
Internet or connected through gateway devices. According to statistics from the Information
Handling Services, the total number of connected devices globally is estimated to be around
25 billion. This figure is projected to triple within a short span of 5 years by the year 2025.
Figure 8 shows the global trend and projection for connected devices worldwide.

Fig. 8 10-year global trend and projection of connected devices (statistics sourced from the
Information Handling Services [7])

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The traffic flowing through the Internet can be attributed to legacy systems as well as
modern-day systems. The miniaturization of electronics and the cheap affordability of
technology is resulting in a surge of connected devices, which in turn is leading to an
explosion of traffic flowing through the Internet.
One of the best examples of this explosion is the evolution of smartphones. In the late 1990’s,
cellular technology was still expensive and which could be afforded only by a select few.
Moreover, these particular devices had only the basic features of voice calling, text
messaging, and sharing of low-quality multimedia. Within the next 10 years, cellular
technology had become common and easily affordable. With time, the features of these
devices evolved, and the dependence of various applications and services on these gadgets on
packet-based Internet accesses started rapidly increasing. The present-day mobile phones
(commonly referred to as smartphones) are more or less Internet-based. The range of
applications on these gadgets such as messaging, video calling, e-mails, games, music
streaming, video streaming, and others are solely dependent on network provider allocated
Internet access or WiFi. Most of the present-day consumers of smartphone technology tend to
carry more than one of these units. In line with this trend, other connected devices have
rapidly increased in numbers resulting in the number of devices exceeding the number of
humans on Earth by multiple times. Now imagine that as all technologies and domains are
moving toward smart management of systems, the number of sensor/actuator-based systems
is rapidly increasing. With time, the need for location-independent access to monitored and
controlled systems keep on rising. This rise in number leads to a further rise in the number of
Internet-connected devices.
The original Internet intended for sending simple messages is now connected with all sorts of
“Things”. These things can be legacy devices, modern-day computers, sensors, actuators,
household appliances, toys, clothes, shoes, vehicles, cameras, and anything which may
benefit a product by increasing its scientific value, accuracy, or even its cosmetic value.
IoT is an anytime, anywhere, and anything (as shown in Figure 9) network of Internet-
connected physical devices or systems capable of sensing an environment and affecting the
sensed environment intelligently. This is generally achieved using low-power and low-form-
factor embedded processors on-board the “things” connected to the Internet. In other words,
IoT may be considered to be made up of connecting devices, machines, and tools; these
things are made up of sensors/actuators and processors, which connect to the Internet through
wireless technologies. Another school of thought also considers wired Internet access to be
inherent to the IoT paradigm. For the sake of harmony, in this book, we will consider any
technology enabling access to the Internet—be it wired or wireless—to be an IoT enabling
technology. However, most of the focus on the discussion of various IoT enablers will be
restricted to wireless IoT systems due to the much more severe operating constraints and
challenges faced by wireless devices as compared to wired systems. Typically, IoT systems
can be characterized by the following features:
• Associated architectures, which are also efficient and scalable.
• No ambiguity in naming and addressing.
• Massive number of constrained devices, sleeping nodes, mobile devices, and non-IP
devices.

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• Intermittent and often unstable connectivity.

Fig. 9 the three characteristic features - anytime, anywhere, and anything - highlight the
robustness and dynamic nature of IoT
IoT is speculated to have achieved faster and higher technology acceptance as compared to
electricity and telephony. These speculations are not ill placed as evident from the various
statistics shown in Figures 10, 11, and 12.

Fig. 10 The global IoT spending across various organizations and industries and its
subsequent projection until the year 2021 (sourced from International Data Corporation)

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Fig. 11 The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of the IoT market (statistics sourced
from)

Fig.12 The IoT market share across various industries (statistics sourced from International
Data Corporation [8])
According to an International Data Corporation (IDC) report, worldwide spending on IoT is
reported to have crossed USD 700 billion. The projected spending on IoT based technologies
worldwide is estimated to be about USD 1:1 trillion. Similarly, the compounded annual
growth rate of IoT between the years 2016 and 2021, as depicted in Figure 11, shows that the
majority of the market share is captured by consumer goods, which is closely followed by
insurance and healthcare industries. However, the combined industrial share of IoT growth
(both cross and resource) is 32% of the collective market, which is again more than that of
the consumer market. In continuation, Figure 12 shows the IoT market share of various
sectors. The manufacturing, logistics, and asset management sectors were purported to be the
largest receivers of IoT-linked investments in 2017.
1.4.2 Evolution of IoT
The IoT, as we see it today, is a result of a series of technological paradigm shifts over a few
decades. The technologies that laid the foundation of connected systems by achieving easy

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integration to daily lives, popular public acceptance, and massive benefits by using connected
solutions can be considered as the founding solutions for the development of IoT. Figure 13
shows the sequence of technological advancements for shaping the IoT as it is today. These
sequence of technical developments toward the emergence of IoT are described in brief:

Fig. 13 The sequence of technological developments leading to the shaping of the modern
day IoT
• ATM: ATMs or automated teller machines are cash distribution machines, which are linked
to a user’s bank account. ATMs dispense cash upon verification of the identity of a user and
their account through a specially coded card. The central concept behind ATMs was the
availability of financial transactions even when banks were closed beyond their regular work
hours. These ATMs were ubiquitous money dispensers. The first ATM became operational
and connected online for the first time in 1974.
• Web: World Wide Web is a global information sharing and communication platform. The
Web became operational for the first time in 1991. Since then, it has been massively
responsible for the many revolutions in the field of computing and communication.
• Smart Meters: The earliest smart meter was a power meter, which became operational in
early 2000. These power meters were capable of communicating remotely with the power
grid. They enabled remote monitoring of subscribers’ power usage and eased the process of
billing and power allocation from grids.
• Digital Locks: Digital locks can be considered as one of the earlier attempts at connected
home-automation systems. Present-day digital locks are so robust that smartphones can be
used to control them. Operations such as locking and unlocking doors, changing key codes,
including new members in the access lists, can be easily performed, and that too remotely
using smartphones.
• Connected Healthcare: Here, healthcare devices connect to hospitals, doctors, and relatives
to alert them of medical emergencies and take preventive measures. The devices may be
simple wearable appliances, monitoring just the heart rate and pulse of the wearer, as well as
regular medical devices and monitors in hospitals. The connected nature of these systems
makes the availability of medical records and test results much faster, cheaper, and
convenient for both patients as well as hospital authorities.
• Connected Vehicles: Connected vehicles may communicate to the Internet or with other
vehicles, or even with sensors and actuators contained within it. These vehicles self-diagnose
themselves and alert owners about system failures.
• Smart Cities: This is a city-wide implementation of smart sensing, monitoring, and
actuation systems. The city-wide infrastructure communicating amongst themselves enables

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unified and synchronized operations and information dissemination. Some of the facilities
which may benefit are parking, transportation, and others.
• Smart Dust: These are microscopic computers. Smaller than a grain of sand each, they can
be used in numerous beneficial ways, where regular computers cannot operate. For example,
smart dust can be sprayed to measure chemicals in the soil or even to diagnose problems in
the human body.
• Smart Factories: These factories can monitor plant processes, assembly lines, distribution
lines, and manage factory floors all on their own. The reduction in mishaps due to human
errors in judgment or un-optimized processes is drastically reduced.
• UAVs: UAVs or unmanned aerial vehicles have emerged as robust public domain solutions
tasked with applications ranging from agriculture, surveys, surveillance, deliveries, stock
maintenance, asset management, and other tasks.
The present-day IoT spans across various domains and applications. The major highlight of
this paradigm is its ability to function as a cross-domain technology enabler. Multiple
domains can be supported and operated upon simultaneously over IoT-based platforms.
Support for legacy technologies and standalone paradigms, along with modern developments,
makes IoT quite robust and economical for commercial, industrial, as well as consumer
applications. IoT is being used in vivid and diverse areas such as smart parking, smartphone
detection, traffic congestion, smart lighting, waste management, smart roads, structural
health, urban noise maps, river floods, water flow, silos stock calculation, water leakages,
radiation levels, explosive and hazardous gases, perimeter access control, snow level
monitoring, liquid presence, forest fire detection, air pollution, smart grid, tank level,
photovoltaic installations, NFC (near-field communications) payments, intelligent shopping
applications, landslide and avalanche prevention, early detection of earthquakes, supply chain
control, smart product management, and others.
Figure 14 shows the various technological interdependencies of IoT with other domains and
networking paradigms such as M2M, CPS, the Internet of environment (IoE), the Internet of
people (IoP), and Industry 4.0. Each of these networking paradigms is a massive domain on
its own, but the omnipresent nature of IoT implies that these domains act as subsets of IoT.
The paradigms are briefly discussed here:

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Figure 14 The interdependence and reach of IoT over various application domains and
networking paradigms
(i) M2M: The M2M or the machine-to-machine paradigm signifies a system of connected
machines and devices, which can talk amongst themselves without human intervention. The
communication between the machines can be for updates on machine status (stocks, health,
power status, and others), collaborative task completion, overall knowledge of the systems
and the environment, and others.
(ii) CPS: The CPS or the cyber physical system paradigm insinuates a closed control loop—
from sensing, processing, and finally to actuation—using a feedback mechanism. CPS helps
in maintaining the state of an environment through the feedback control loop, which ensures
that until the desired state is attained, the system keeps on actuating and sensing. Humans
have a simple supervisory role in CPS-based systems; most of the ground-level operations are
automated.
(iii) IoE: The IoE paradigm is mainly concerned with minimizing and even reversing the ill-
effects of the permeation of Internet-based technologies on the environment. The major focus
areas of this paradigm include smart and sustainable farming, sustainable and energy-efficient
habitats, enhancing the energy efficiency of systems and processes, and others. In brief, we
can safely assume that any aspect of IoT that concerns and affects the environment, falls
under the purview of IoE.
(iv) Industry 4.0: Industry 4.0 is commonly referred to as the fourth industrial revolution
pertaining to digitization in the manufacturing industry. The previous revolutions
chronologically dealt with mechanization, mass production, and the industrial revolution,
respectively. This paradigm strongly puts forward the concept of smart factories, where
machines talk to one another without much human involvement based on a framework of
CPS and IoT. The digitization and connectedness in Industry 4.0 translate to better resource
and workforce management, optimization of production time and resources, and better
upkeep and lifetimes of industrial systems.
(v) IoP: IoP is a new technological movement on the Internet which aims to decentralize
online social interactions, payments, transactions, and other tasks while maintaining

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confidentiality and privacy of its user’s data. A famous site for IoP states that as the
introduction of the Bitcoin has severely limited the power of banks and governments, the
acceptance of IoP will limit the power of corporations, governments, and their spy agencies.

4.3 IoT versus M2M

M2M or the machine-to-machine paradigm refers to communications and interactions
between various machines and devices. These interactions can be enabled through a cloud
computing infrastructure, a server, or simply a local network hub. M2M collects data from
machinery and sensors, while also enabling device management and device interaction.
Telecommunication services providers introduced the term M2M, and technically
emphasized on machine interactions via one or more communication networks (e.g., 3G, 4G,
5G, satellite, public networks). M2M is part of the IoT and is considered as one of its sub-
domains, as shown in Figure 4.7. M2M standards occupy a core place in the IoT landscape.
However, in terms of operational and functional scope, IoT is vaster than M2M and
comprises a broader range of interactions such as the interactions between devices/things,
things, and people, things and applications, and people with applications; M2M enables the
amalgamation of workflows comprising such interactions within IoT. Internet connectivity is
central to the IoT theme but is not necessarily focused on the use of telecom networks.
4.4 IoT versus CPS
Cyber physical systems(CPS) encompasses sensing, control, actuation, and feedback as a
complete package. In other words, a digital twin is attached to a CPS-based system. As
mentioned earlier, a digital twin is a virtual system–model relation, in which the system
signifies a physical system or equipment or a piece of machinery, while the model represents
the mathematical model or representation of the physical system’s behaviour or operation.
Many a time, a digital twin is used parallel to a physical system, especially in CPS as it
allows for the comparison of the physical system’s output, performance, and health. Based on
feedback from the digital twin, a physical system can be easily given corrective
directions/commands to obtain desirable outputs. In contrast, the IoT paradigm does not
compulsorily need feedback or a digital twin system. IoT is more focused on networking than
controls. Some of the constituent sub-systems in an IoT environment (such as those formed
by CPS-based instruments and networks) may include feedback and controls too. In this light,
CPS may be considered as one of the sub-domains of IoT, as shown in Figure 14.
4.5 IoT versus WoT
From a developer’s perspective, the Web of Things (WoT) paradigm enables access and
control over IoT resources and applications. These resources and applications are generally
built using technologies such as HTML 5.0, JavaScript, Ajax, PHP, and others. REST
(representational state transfer) is one of the key enablers of WoT. The use of RESTful
principles and RESTful APIs (application program interface) enables both developers and
deployers to benefit from the recognition, acceptance, and maturity of existing web
technologies without having to redesign and redeploy solutions from scratch. Still, designing
and building the WoT paradigm has various adaptability and security challenges, especially
when trying to build a globally uniform WoT. As IoT is focused on creating networks
comprising objects, things, people, systems, and applications, which often do not consider the
unification aspect and the limitations of the Internet, the need for WoT, which aims to

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integrate the various focus areas of IoT into the existing Web is really invaluable.
Technically, WoT can be thought of as an application layer-based hat added over the network
layer. However, the scope of IoT applications is much broader; IoT also which includes non-
IP-based systems that are not accessible through the web.
4.6 Enabling IoT and the Complex Interdependence of Technologies
IoT is a paradigm built upon complex interdependencies of technologies (both legacy and
modern), which occur at various planes of this paradigm. Regarding Figure 15, we can divide
the IoT paradigm into four planes: services, local connectivity, global connectivity, and
processing. If we consider a bottom-up view, the services offered fall under the control and
purview of service providers. The service plane is composed of two parts: 1) things or
devices and 2) low-power connectivity.

Fig. 15 The IoT planes, various enablers of IoT, and the complex interdependencies among
them

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Typically, the services offered in this layer are a combination of things and low-power
connectivity. For example, any IoT application requires the basic setup of sensing, followed
by rudimentary processing (often), and a low-power, low-range network, which is mainly
built upon the IEEE 802.15.4 protocol. The things may be wearables, computers,
smartphones, household appliances, smart glasses, factory machinery, vending machines,
vehicles, UAVs, robots, and other such contraptions (which may even be just a sensor). The
immediate low-power connectivity, which is responsible for connecting the things in local
implementation, may be legacy protocols such as WiFi, Ethernet, or cellular. In contrast,
modern-day technologies are mainly wireless and often programmable such as Zigbee, RFID,
Bluetooth, 6LoWPAN, LoRA, DASH, Insteon, and others. The range of these connectivity
technologies is severely restricted; they are responsible for the connectivity between the
things of the IoT and the nearest hub or gateway to access the Internet.
The local connectivity is responsible for distributing Internet access to multiple local IoT
deployments. This distribution may be on the basis of the physical placement of the things,
on the basis of the application domains, or even on the basis of providers of services. Services
such as address management, device management, security, sleep scheduling, and others fall
within the scope of this plane. For example, in a smart home environment, the first floor and
the ground floor may have local IoT implementations, which have various things connected
to the network via low-power, low-range connectivity technologies. The traffic from these
two floors merges into a single router or a gateway. The total traffic intended for the Internet
from a smart home leaves through a single gateway or router, which may be assigned a single
global IP address (for the whole house). This helps in the significant conservation of already
limited global IP addresses. The local connectivity plane falls under the purview of IoT
management as it directly deals with strategies to use/reuse addresses based on things and
applications. The modern-day “edge computing” paradigm is deployed in conjunction with
these first two planes: services and local connectivity.
In continuation, the penultimate plane of global connectivity plays a significant role in
enabling IoT in the real sense by allowing for worldwide implementations and connectivity
between things, users, controllers, and applications. This plane also falls under the purview of
IoT management as it decides how and when to store data, when to process it, when to
forward it, and in which form to forward it. The Web, data-centers, remote servers, Cloud,
and others make up this plane. The paradigm of “fog computing” lies between the planes of
local connectivity and global connectivity. It often serves to manage the load of global
connectivity infrastructure by offloading the computation nearer to the source of the data
itself, which reduces the traffic load on the global Internet.
The final plane of processing can be considered as a top-up of the basic IoT networking
framework. The continuous rise in the usefulness and penetration of IoT in various
application areas such as industries, transportation, healthcare, and others is the result of this
plane. The members in this plane may be termed as IoT tools, simply because they wring-out
useful and human-readable information from all the raw data that flows from various IoT
devices and deployments. The various sub-domains of this plane include intelligence,
conversion (data and format conversion, and data cleaning), learning (making sense of
temporal and spatial data patterns), cognition (recognizing patterns and mapping it to already
known patterns), algorithms (various control and monitoring algorithms), visualization
(rendering numbers and strings in the form of collective trends, graphs, charts, and

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projections), and analysis (estimating the usefulness of the generated information, making
sense of the information with respect to the application and place of data generation, and
estimating future trends based on past and present patterns of information obtained). Various
computing paradigms such as “big data”, “machine learning”, and others, fall within the
scope of this domain.

4.7 IoT Networking Components

An IoT implementation is composed of several components, which may vary with their
application domains. Various established works such as that by Savolainen et al. generally
outline five broad categories of IoT networking components. However, we outline the broad
components that come into play during the establishment of any IoT network, into six types:
1) IoT node, 2) IoT router, 3) IoT LAN, 4) IoT WAN, 5) IoT gateway, and 6) IoT proxy. A
typical IoT implementation from a networking perspective is shown in Figure 16. The
individual components are briefly described here:

Fig. 16 A typical IoT network ecosystem highlighting the various networking components -
from IoT nodes to the Internet
(i) IoT Node: These are the networking devices within an IoT LAN. Each of these devices is
typically made up of a sensor, a processor, and a radio, which communicates with the
network infrastructure (either within the LAN or outside it). The nodes may be connected to
other nodes inside a LAN directly or bymeans of a common gateway for that LAN.
Connections outside the LAN are through gateways and proxies.
(ii) IoT Router: An I oT router is a piece of networking equipment that is primarily tasked
with the routing of packets between various entities in the IoT network; it keeps the traffic
flowing correctly within the network. A router can be repurposed as a gateway by enhancing
its functionalities.

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(iii) IoT LAN: The local area network (LAN) enables local connectivity within the purview
of a single gateway. Typically, they consist of short-range connectivity technologies. IoT
LANs may or may not be connected to the Internet. Generally, they are localized within a
building or an organization.
(iv) IoT WAN: The wide area network (WAN) connects various network segments such as
LANs. They are typically organizationally and geographically wide, with their operational
range lying between a few kilometers to hundreds of kilometers. IoT WANs connect to the
Internet and enable Internet access to the segments they are connecting.
(v) IoT Gateway: An IoT gateway is simply a router connecting the IoT LAN to a WAN or
the Internet. Gateways can implement several LANs and WANs. Their primary task is to
forward packets between LANs and WANs, and the IP layer using only layer 3.
(vi) IoT Proxy: Proxies actively lie on the application layer and performs application layer
functions between IoT nodes and other entities. Typically, application layer proxies are a
means of providing security to the network entities under it; it helps to extend the addressing
range of its network.
In Figure 16, various IoT nodes within an IoT LAN are configured to to one another as well
as talk to the IoT router whenever they are in the range of it. The devices have locally unique
(LU-x) device identifiers. These identifiers are unique only within a LAN. There is a high
chance that these identifiers may be repeated in a new LAN. Each IoT LAN has its own
unique identifier, which is denoted by IoT LAN-x in Figure 16. A router acts as a connecting
link between various LANs by forwarding messages from the LANs to the IoT gateway or
the IoT proxy. As the proxy is an application layer device, it is additionally possible to
include features such as firewalls, packet filters, and other security measures besides the
regular routing operations. Various gateways connect to an IoT WAN, which links these
devices to the Internet. There may be cases where the gateway or the proxy may directly
connect to the Internet. This network may be wired or wireless; however, IoT deployments
heavily rely on wireless solutions. This is mainly attributed to the large number of devices
that are integrated into the network; wireless technology is the only feasible and neat-enough
solution to avoid the hassles of laying wires and dealing with the restricted mobility rising out
of wired connections.

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