IoT, Volume 5, Issue 1 (March 2024) – 9 articles

This research introduces an innovative smart cane architecture designed to empower visually impaired individuals. Integrating advanced sensors and social media connectivity, the smart cane enhances accessibility and encourages physical activity. Three meticulously developed algorithms ensure accurate step counting, swing detection, and proximity measurement. The smart cane’s architecture comprises the platform, communications, sensors, calculation, and user interface layers, providing comprehensive assistance for visually impaired individuals. Hardware components include an audio–tactile interaction module, input command module, microphone integration, local storage, step count module, cloud integration, and rechargeable battery. Software v1.9.7 components include Facebook Chat API integration, Python Facebook API integration, fbchat library integration, and Speech Recognition library integration. Overall, the proposed smart cane offers a comprehensive solution to enhance mobility, accessibility, and social engagement for visually impaired individuals. This study represents a significant stride toward a more inclusive society, leveraging technology to create meaningful impact in the lives of those with visual impairments. By fostering socialization and independence, our smart cane not only improves mobility but also enhances the overall well-being of the visually impaired community. Full article

Cardiovascular disease is one of the leading causes of death in the world. Heart failure is a cardiovascular disease in which the heart is unable to pump sufficient blood to fulfill the body’s requirements and can lead to fluid overload. Traditional solutions are not adequate to address the progression of heart failure. Herein, we report a body-mounted wearable sensor to monitor the parameters related to heart failure. These include heart rate, blood oxygen saturation, thoracic impedance, and activity status. The device is compact and wearable and measures the parameters continuously in real time. The device is an Internet of Things (IoT) device connected with a cloud-based database enabling the parameters to be visualized on a mobile application. Full article

Edge data analytics refers to processing near data sources at the edge of the network to reduce delays in data transmission and, consequently, enable real-time interactions. However, data analytics at the edge introduces numerous security risks that can impact the data being processed. Thus, safeguarding sensitive data from being exposed to illegitimate users is crucial to avoiding uncertainties and maintaining the overall quality of the service offered. Most existing edge security models have considered attacks during data analysis as an afterthought. In this paper, an overview of edge data analytics in healthcare, traffic management, and smart city use cases is provided, including the possible attacks and their impacts on edge data analytics. Further, existing models are investigated to understand how these attacks are handled and research gaps are identified. Finally, research directions to enhance data analytics at the edge are presented. Full article

Internet of Things (IoT) devices have changed how billions of people in the world connect and interact with each other. But, as more people use IoT devices, many questions arise about how these devices handle private data and whether they properly ask for permission when using it. Due to information privacy regulations such as the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which requires companies to seek permission from data subjects (DS) before using their data, it is crucial for IoT companies to obtain this permission correctly. However, this can be really challenging in the IoT world because people often find it difficult to interact with and manage multiple IoT devices under their control. Also, the rules about privacy are not always clear. As such, this paper proposes a new model to improve how consent is managed in the world of IoT. The model seeks to minimize “consent fatigue” (when people get tired of always being asked for permission) and give DS more control over how their data are shared. This includes having default permission settings, being able to compare similar devices, and, in the future, using AI to give personalized advice. The model allows users to easily review and change their IoT device permissions if previous conditions are not met. It also emphasizes the need for easily understandable privacy rules, clear communication with users, and robust tracking of consent for data usage. By using this model, companies that provide IoT services can do a better job of protecting user privacy and managing DS consent. In addition, companies can more easily comply with data protection laws and build stronger relationships with their customers. Full article

With the rapid rise of digitalization in the global economy, home security systems have become increasingly important for personal comfort and property protection. The collaboration between humans, the Internet of Things (IoT), and smart homes can be highly efficient. Interaction considers convenience, efficiency, security, responsiveness, and automation. This study aims to develop and assess IoT-based home security systems utilizing passive infrared (PIR) sensors to improve user interface, security, and automation controls using voice commands and buttons across different communication protocols. The proposed system incorporates controls for lighting and intrusion monitoring, as well as assessing both the functionality of voice commands and the precision of intruder detection via the PIR sensors. Intelligent light control and PIR intruder detection with a variable delay time for response detection are unified into the research methodology. The test outcomes examine the average effective response time in-depth, revealing performance distinctions among wireless fidelity (Wi-Fi) and fourth- and fifth-generation mobile connections. The outcomes illustrate the reliability of voice-activated light control via Google Assistant, with response accuracy rates of 83 percent for Thai voice commands and 91.50 percent for English voice commands. Moreover, the Blynk mobile application provided exceptional precision regarding operating light-button commands. The PIR motion detectors have a one hundred percent detection accuracy, and a 2.5 s delay is advised for PIR detection. Extended PIR detection delays result in prolonged system response times. This study examines the intricacies of response times across various environmental conditions, considering different degrees of mobile communication quality. This study ultimately advances the field by developing an IoT system prepared for efficient integration into everyday life, holding the potential to provide improved convenience, time-saving effectiveness, cost-efficiency, and enhanced home security protocols. Full article

In an agricultural system, finding suitable watering, pesticides, and soil content to provide the right nutrients for the right plant remains challenging. Plants cannot speak and cannot ask for the food they require. These problems can be addressed by applying intelligent (fuzzy logic) controllers to IoT devices in order to enhance communication between crops, ground mobile robots, aerial robots, and the entire farm system. The application of fuzzy logic in agriculture is a promising technology that can be used to optimize crop yields and reduce water usage. It was developed based on language and the air properties in agricultural fields. The entire system was simulated in the MATLAB/SIMULINK environment with Cisco Packet Tracer integration. The inputs for the system were soil moisture sensors, temperature sensors, and humidity sensors, and the outputs were pump flow, valve opening, water level, and moisture in the sounding. The obtained results were the output of the valve opening, moisture in the sounding, pump flow rate, outflow, water level, and ADH values, which are 10.00000013 rad/s, 34.72%, 4.494%, 0.025 m³/s, 73.31 cm³, and 750 values, respectively. The outflow rate increase indicates that water is being released from the tanks, and the control signal fluctuates, indicating that the valve is opening. Full article

This paper describes the development activity that has been carried out for a living laboratory for the city of Cagliari aimed at functioning as a learning center for local SMEs willing to improve their skills in IoT and create applications that will be integrated in an open innovation ecosystem. The many users belonging to the various SMEs involved in the project required an ICT laboratory with a platform that could manage them and provide a multi-tenant environment for the development of IoT applications. The architecture also had to be scalable and interoperable, and the resulting platform had to collect many kinds of data from sensors or other data sources, elaborate them, and show georeferenced information on a 3D satellite interactive view along with statistics on side panels. This work was based on a platform already developed by CRS4 for a previous project. Preserving the concept of the decision-making tool for Smart Cities, almost every component was redesigned, and, in this paper, we describe the new solutions that have been implemented. Starting from the former structure, further features were added in a novel way in order to offer an enhanced framework that can deal with the activities of the laboratory, exploiting the scalability of the open-source systems involved, their robustness and flexibility, and leveraging domain standards. In this article, the main challenges involved in the development of the platform are described, as well as the solutions that have been implemented so far. Full article

The Internet of Things (IoT) is a technology that can connect billions of devices or “things” to other devices (machine to machine) or even to people via an existing infrastructure. IoT applications in real-world scenarios include smart cities, smart houses, connected appliances, shipping, monitoring, smart supply chain management, and smart grids. As the number of devices all over the world is increasing (in all aspects of daily life), huge amounts of data are being produced as a result. New issues are therefore arising from the use and development of current technologies, regarding new applications, regulation, cloud computing, security, and privacy. The blockchain has shown promise in terms of securing and preserving the privacy of users and data, in a decentralized manner. In particular, Hyperledger Fabric v2.x is a new generation of blockchain that is open source and offers versatility, modularity, and performance. In this paper, a blockchain as a service (BaaS) application based on Hyperledger Fabric is presented to address the security and privacy challenges associated with the IoT. A new architecture is introduced to enable this integration, and is developed and deployed, and its performance is analyzed in real-world scenarios. We also propose a new data structure with encryption based on public and private keys for enhanced security and privacy. Full article

In recent times, the advent of innovative technological paradigms like the Internet of Things has paved the way for numerous applications that enhance the quality of human life. A remarkable application of IoT that has emerged is the Internet of Vehicles (IoV), motivated by an unparalleled surge of connected vehicles on the roads. IoV has become an area of significant interest due to its potential in enhancing traffic safety as well as providing accurate routing information. The primary objective of IoV is to maintain strict latency standards while ensuring confidentiality and security. Given the high mobility and limited bandwidth, vehicles need to have rapid and frequent authentication. Securing Vehicle-to-Roadside unit (V2R) and Vehicle-to-Vehicle (V2V) communications in IoV is essential for preventing critical information leakage to an adversary or unauthenticated users. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a novel mutual authentication protocol which incorporates hardware-based security primitives, namely physically unclonable functions (PUFs) with Multi-Input Multi-Output (MIMO) physical layer communications. The protocol allows a V2V and V2R to mutually authenticate each other without the involvement of a trusted third-party (server). The protocol design effectively mitigates modeling attacks and impersonation attempts, where the accuracy of predicting the value of each PUF response bit does not exceed 54%, which is equivalent to a random guess. Full article