The Unavoidable Union of IoT and Big Data

The number of connected devices changing how we process personal data could soon be in the billions. As we dive further into the age of big data, the question looming largest is: How do we protect our privacy?

The vast majority of new IoT offerings are rooted in gathering data. Typically, this data is served up to consumers or enterprises to provide details on how efficiently their bodies or machines are running, and even compare new trends identified in such performance data to similar people and things.

Impacting health care

We see one example in sensors that detect and deliver biometrics information to the cloud about end users as they exercise, consume food and beverages, sleep and undertake every imaginable physical task. Such detailed data collection allows new behavioral patterns and health and wellness trends to be identified and acted upon, ultimately creating enormous value for the millions of people generating it.

For more serious medical issues, new sensors gathering data on patient response to medicines, treatments and therapies will inform health care practices, making them more beneficial and more precise as the big data associated with these finding continues to be understood and acted upon.

RFID for virtually any object

Radio- frequency identification ( RFID) creates broader implications for the IoT and big data to encompass virtually all fields of human endeavor. RFID tags can be attached to almost any object and generate data about its location, motion, physical state, temperature, moisture level, etc.

It is the multiplicity of such applications of IoT micro- data that creates new use cases for the big data aggregate. Analyzing vast quantities of small bits of information reveals valuable new insights that can be leveraged to improve one’s individual health, or improve the bottom- line for businesses through improved marketing, logistics and other operations.

Owning your data

Privacy will certainly remain a key concern as big data continues to yield new applications and learnings. Who has the right to access and act upon all the data that’s generated through the IoT? The most enlightened solutions providers agree: the end- user owns his or her data, and should be enabled to provide explicit directions for its use. Expect this aspect to be hotly debated as the IoT and big data continue to jointly develop.