Phil Howard INFORMATION · TECHNOLOGY · SOCIETY

Idea to retire: A closed-platform Internet of Things

The Internet has gone through a major transition: in the year 2015, the number of devices connected by the Internet surpassed the number of people connected by the Internet. Public policymakers need to move past the idea that the Internet is something that we experience through a browser, using our mobile phones and personal computers. The Internet of Things (IoT) is here.

Vast amounts of bandwidth are now used by devices communicating about their status and our behavior. Experts estimate that there will be over 60 billion devices in the IoT by 2020.  That means almost a million new devices are being connected to the Internet each hour—and the time to craft public policy is now.

(Continue reading in the Brookings Institution TechTank Blog.)

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