IoTiocy
I may be the first to come up with this terrible neologism, but the time for it is certainly at hand. There have been a number of high-profile incidents where the security of stuff that was connected to the Internet was neglected in the rush to get it connected, or highly dubious design decisions were made in order to get an IoT “thing” to market.
The term originally came up when I was discussing this widget with a friend of mine. The NodeMCU boards are pretty sweet, and are based on the ESP-8266, which is also pretty sweet. The motor driver chip they used is from the 1970s, and there are far better ones available. The VNH2SP30 is a beast, and can supply 10x the current of the L293D, although you’d need two of them for dual motors, so there may be a horses for courses argument to be made there.
The DDoS that took out Krebs On Security, though, doesn’t really have a similar argument going for it. IoT security is hard because the devices don’t have a great interface for users to tighten up their security settings (if indeed, they have any security settings), and users don’t expect to have to tighten up the security of their appliances. As a result, insecure IoT stuff just kind of hangs out in dubious parts of the web, waiting for someone to make it a questionable offer of employment.
To the people who make things incomplete, weak, or insecure, I dedicate this new word:
IoTiot noun, informal
- A person or company that creates IoT devices lacking security, solid design, or even a purpose, usually in order to make a quick grab for cash.
- Any such device, once it starts behaving as it was designed (which is to say “badly”).
Similarly: IoTiotic, IoTiots, IoTiocy
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