Worldwide spending on Internet of Things (IoT) security will reach $1.5 billion in 2018, according to the bean counters at Gartner.
A recent Gartne survey found that nearly 20 per cent of organisations had at least one IoT-based attack in the past three years.
Gartner research director Ruggero Contu said that organisations often don’t have control over the source and nature of the software and hardware being used by smart connected devices.
“We expect to see demand for tools and services aimed at improving discovery and asset management, software and hardware security assessment, and penetration testing.”
Contu said organisations would look to increase their understanding of the implications of externalising network connectivity.
“These factors will be the main drivers of spending growth for the forecast period with spending on IoT security expected to reach $3.1 billion in 2021.”
Gartner predicts that through 2020, the most significant inhibitor to growth for IoT security will come from a lack of prioritisation and implementation of security best practices and tools in IoT initiative planning. This will hamper the potential spend on IoT security by 80 percent.
“Although IoT security is consistently referred to as a primary concern, most IoT security implementations have been planned, deployed and operated at the business-unit level, in cooperation with some IT departments to ensure the IT portions affected by the devices are sufficiently addressed”, said Contu.
“However, coordination via common architecture or a consistent security strategy is all but absent, and vendor product and service selection remain largely ad hoc, based upon the device provider’s alliances with partners or the core system that the devices are enhancing or replacing.”
