The trend towards the Internet of Things: what does it help in disaster and risk management?

GRF Davos Planet@Risk, Volume 3, Number 1, March 2015, pp. 140-145:

This paper argues for an open, standardized approach of sensor-based global information management based upon international standards. It provides an overview about the relevant initiatives (e.g. GEOSS, European Research Cluster on the Internet of Things IERC) and standardization bodies (e.g. ISO, OGC) and their architectural approaches for the IoT. Furthermore, it presents highlights and results of relevant projects, e.g. EO2HEAVEN in the domains of environment and health, TRIDEC for better decision support in tsunami early warning systems, and OpenIoT for an open source IoT software platform.

The paper concludes with an assessment of the current user requirements and technological trends as well as a discussion of the next steps to be taken in order to exploit the IoT potential for the benefit of risk and disaster management improvement, however, also having in mind cyber security concerns.