IoT devices often have limited CPU, memory, and storage, making it harder to implement standard security practices like encryption, antivirus, or firewalls.
Scale & Diversity
Tens of thousands of devices across varied vendors, architectures, and protocols – managing patches, certs, or configs becomes overwhelming.
Physical Exposure
Devices are often in uncontrolled environments – they can be physically accessed, tampered with, or stolen (e.g., smart meters, parking sensors).
Long Lifespan, Poor Updates
Devices may stay deployed for years with no update mechanism, or vendors may no longer support them. Many lack OTA update capabilities.
Default/Insecure Configurations
Hardcoded credentials, open ports, outdated firmware, and unnecessary services expose systems by default.
Lack of Standardization
There’s no universal security standard across the IoT ecosystem, leading to fragmented and inconsistent implementations.
Application Layer
├── Insecure APIs
├── Poor session management
├── Weak input validation (XSS, injection)
├── No rate limiting or abuse detection
Data Layer
├── Data in transit (no encryption)
├── Data at rest (unencrypted databases)
├── Insecure cloud storage (e.g., public S3 buckets)
├── Lack of data integrity checks
Communication Layer
├── MITM on MQTT/CoAP
├── Replay attacks due to lack of freshness
├── Weak cipher suites