What is IoT Testing? Approaches, Types & Tools

OVERVIEW

IoT testing is a crucial procedure that entails conducting a range of comprehensive tests on your IoT solution to ensure its readiness for real-life software applications. It proactively identify and addresses vulnerabilities within IoT solutions to ensure that it functions flawlessly, mitigating potential risks and maximizing its performance and security.

As Brendan O'Brien aptly stated, "If you think that the Internet has changed your life, think again. The Internet of Things is about to change it all over again!" This quote highlights the transformative impact that the Internet of Things (IoT) will have on our lives, emphasizing the significance of thorough IoT testing to ensure the seamless integration and reliable operation of IoT solutions in the interconnected world.

When we hear the term “Internet of Things,” it gives an impression of a separate network that belongs solely to “things” or “objects,” which are anything other than conventional devices or systems. A more suitable term seems like “Internet for Things,” which gives the impression of adding an object to our existing network of devices and systems.

The Internet of Things (IoT) industry is experiencing significant growth and has already become a multi-billion dollar sector. According to a recent report, the projected number of Internet of Things (IoT) devices is expected to surpass 25 billion by the year 2030.

To avoid substantial losses, it is crucial for organizations operating in the IoT industry to prioritize IoT testing. Through comprehensive testing processes, potential defects and vulnerabilities within IoT devices can be identified and addressed before they reach the market.

What is the Internet of Things?

When we talk about the “Internet of Things,” we consider a network of devices that can communicate with each other and other systems. These systems can be on the same network, or the communication can be done through the Internet. But, they are generally built to accomplish a single task and do not require human involvement once set up. This is why we do not call a smartphone or a PC an IoT device, even though they also come with tons of sensors.

The term “Internet of Things” compels us to think that the network is always the Internet. This is actually not true. For instance, a tire pressure system is an IoT system with a sensor on the tire, and the measure of pressure value is displayed on the car dashboard. In such a system, no Internet is involved, but it is considered IoT. The second half of the term “IoT,” i.e., “things,” denotes man-made objects that have attached sensors to them and are enabled for data transfer, such as a car dashcam.

This property of being attached to a device has been an important factor in its increasing usage over the years. Today, more than 15 billion IoT devices are working globally, and this number is growing by a staggering 16% rate annually.

IoT devices have enabled us to use the power of networking and data transfer for almost anything, which Peterson, CEO of NetSilicon, predicted in 2004 when he said, “The next era of information technology will be dominated by IoT devices.” The effect of this statement is clearly visible today.

We can find IoT devices all around us, from watches to cloud-based CCTV to soil moisture detectors for agriculture. The main reason behind this growth could be the low price of chips today, making the production (especially bulk production) of any IoT considerably cheaper than it would have cost us a decade ago. Hence, the lower production costs mean a lower selling price which is a win-win for all.

Evolution of IoT

When we look at an IoT device today, we might not be able to guess its journey as it is economical for buyers and is easy to make for manufacturers. Learning and building an IoT device that can perform basic operations is relatively easy for a developer. But similar to us, its inventors, too, would not have guessed that a device so heavy would be integrated into light bulbs within a few years.

In the 1970s, ARPANET and TCP/IP had proved their mettle in the networking ground. At that time, they were doing wonders, and their success meant a lot more experiments to explore the potential of individuals, researchers, and organizations.

One such experiment conducted at Carnegie Mellon University attached ARPANET to the Coca-Cola vending machine. This was done by a student David Nichols as he was tired of going to the machine and finding out that the bottles weren’t even cold. With the connected network, the machine could report its inventory data and whether the new stock is cold or not.

A few years later, in 1990, the first object connected to the Internet became a toaster. This toaster was connected to the computer by John Romkey and could be turned on and off from the system directly.

In 1991, Mark Weiser published a paper titled “The Computer of the 21st Century” that starts with the following lines:

“The most profound technologies are those that disappear. They weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it.”

A vision that turned out to be true 30 years later, the paper explores how laptops and PCs are a window to the world but are still focused on a single box. A need for systems connecting humans to tasks that are “actually” of their concerns is missing, which could be fulfilled by introducing “Ubiquitous computing."

In the same year, to resolve the issue of people who wanted coffee but used to find out that the pot was empty after going to the coffee room, the first webcam was put up at the University of Cambridge.

With this webcam, people could see the images uploaded every three minutes and find out whether the coffee was in the pot. This was the time when World Wide Web got introduced, and since this webcam was so popular, it became a famous webcam whose images were presented on a live feed to the world. This whole incident is popularly known as the Trojan Room Coffee Pot.

Introduction of RFID (Radio-frequency identification) into smart things

Until this point, the objects were not connected to the Internet but only within the private network of the university or organization. On the other hand, Kevin Ashton presented an idea of integrating RFID into the P&G (Procter & Gamble) product supply chain and then connecting the reader to the Internet. Since “Internet” was the buzzword at that time and he needed approvals to implement this, he called this process “Internet of Things.” Since then, it has been called that, even if the device is not connected to the Internet.

Once the process picked up, the world started to see a rise in objects connected with the Internet (or internal network) as the various organization's attention moved towards it. Cisco confirmed the extreme rise and popularity by mentioning that there would be a point in time when “things or objects” would be connected more to the Internet than people. In 2023, the reality seems to be just that.

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Benefits of an IoT Device

One IoT device is generally aimed at accomplishing a single task, and there is no standard for which device can be categorized as IoT. If the object can be connected to the network and transfer any type of data, it is considered an IoT device. If we combine all the popular IoT devices and generalize their characteristics (that an IoT can possess), we get the following results:

Real-time analysis

The trojan coffee pot uploaded the image of the coffee pot once in three minutes. However, things have progressed compared to those times, and the fast network speeds help us analyze IoT data - either video or measurement or anything in real-time. Measuring and capturing real-time data (such as continuously measuring every few milliseconds) is humanly impossible; therefore, IoT devices significantly increase post-data processing steps' efficiency.

Enhanced customer experience

An IoT device can be installed for real-time analysis for the organization and the customer. For instance, an OBD (On-board diagnostics) device is usually used by vehicle owners to track the health of their automobiles driven by their employees, such as in taxi services. The OBD device can provide real-time data to the customer directly visible at a website link which was earlier done using a phone call to the driver. Tracking hundreds of vehicles was much tougher; therefore, such IoT devices enhance customer experience, which is usually the main goal of a business.

Sensitive parameters can be monitored error-free

In the fields where there is no scope for errors, we need a tool that can be trusted. Implementing IoT devices in these domains, such as in medical systems, is safer and more reliable, which leads us to evaluate the issues better and generate more effective results associated with them.

Logical and structured data-gathering

IoT devices have sensors that constantly monitor and collect data as intended. They can be linked to websites that collect this data and apply algorithms to present it to the organization. This can be processed data (or even cleaned data), and the algorithms can help us make patterns and even perform data mining.

Serve as the basis for future decisions

The information gathered by IoT devices is converted to patterns and analyzed by data analysts and other team members. This data then serves as the foundation for making critical business decisions, such as finalizing the areas of improvement by analyzing the weaknesses. Although, sometimes, it may require more than one type of IoT device to understand the underlying causes.

Helps in business growth

When we enhance the customer experience in our business, more customers tend to enroll as an experience generally overshadows the price. This will naturally drive more growth and revenue in the business.

The second reason is the collection of data and observing the associated patterns, which can help us focus on a particular domain more than the other. This can save our businesses from exposing their weaknesses to the end-user, and we can cover this up in the early stages.

Cost and time reduction

Finally, there are cost reductions in the expense sheets when IoT devices take over instead of human beings. The declining costs of chips inside IoT devices also help reduce costs when mass production is achieved.

For customers, along with costs, IoT devices also help bring down the time-wastage in various domains. For instance, if we jump back to our tire pressure monitoring system, we can save a lot of time with IoT devices as opposed to checking the pressure manually every day.

Along with these general benefits, a specific IoT device will come with its own advantages for the user that may not be applied to others.

IoT Architecture

The architecture of IoT as a complete system helps establish all the required goals for the customer and the organization. Since IoTs do not have a general definition and anything with a sensor can be theoretically referred to as an IoT device, the components of the device may vary according to the final product. However, since we have established a few ground rules in this IoT testing tutorial regarding the behavior of an IoT device in general, we can list down necessary components based on those rules and tag compatible devices as IoT products.

Device or Sensor

An IoT device starts from a physical object which can be manufactured with specific requirements, or a sensor can be attached to a third-party object. For instance, if someone needs to develop a CCTV camera, they need to manufacture the device with their own specification and hardware.

However, if anyone uses a tire pressure monitoring system, the sensors can be attached directly to the tire frame, and a third party manufactures those tires. These sensors are encased but may not be as complex as a complete device.

The placement of this device occurs at the site where IoT needs are being implemented. The gathering of data takes place through the utilization of sensors on this device.

Data collection

Once the devices are installed, the next component is data acquisition through the sensors. The data can be selective based on sensors, or we can gather everything from a particular environment. For instance, if an IoT device just aims to collect usage, parameters can also be modified to collect the usage time. It completely depends on the organization providing the IoT device.

The data collection part is not always communicated through the Internet. Sometimes, IoT devices can also be used for local data collection in memory devices such as memory cards. This can also be transferred live to the internal network, or we can completely skip the data collection component in cases where just the current parameter needs to be displayed. However, since data gives us insights into many things, it is always recommended to seal out these important parameters to help grow the business.

Data filtering and analysis

The data thus collected in the previous stage needs to be filtered and analyzed before transferring to the network or the cloud. This stage is required to understand the duplicate data or unwanted data and transfer only relevant data to the cloud. It helps save bandwidth and cleaning time on the servers.

Data transfer

The final component in the IoT architecture is to transfer this data to various ends depending on the type of arrangement. The data can either be transferred to the cloud, from where a user can retrieve it by connecting to the servers. Otherwise, the data can also be transferred directly to the user’s end on the internal network or the live stream with a minimum delay.

If someone is building a device and these four components and their workings stand true as described above, the device can be labeled as an IoT device. As mentioned above, there may be more than the components discussed above depending on the type of device and the requirement it fulfills at the user’s end.

Technologies Used in IoT Devices

The IoT architecture used to create a device is what qualifies it to be called an Internet of Things. However, all those components need technologies to work together among themselves and with the server outside their networks or to communicate with the users. These technologies keep changing as the technological world grows and new researches pop up. However, our list constitutes technologies invented long before but still used in many IoT devices and help achieve their goals.

RFID (Radio Frequency Identification)

While discussing the evolution of IoT devices, we briefly brushed upon the role RFID played during the initial days. It was the first technology embedded into “things” and motivated people to popularize the term “Internet of Things.”

RFID is shorthand for Radio Frequency Identification. It is a very simple system that involves two objects that also work as two components of the system. The first object is equipped with an RFID tag, and the necessary information is embedded. This is attached to the objects whose information we need to get. The second object is a reader that broadcasts a signal through the antenna. These signals receive the necessary response from the tag and pass this information to the reader. The reader then sends this data to the computer for processing further through the Internet, etc.

The process is straightforward and has been an active part of IoT devices that satisfy the requirements. As one can observe, RFID implementation into IoT requires a tag on the objects it needs to scan. So for organizations dealing with RFID, appropriate tag installations are required.

Also, since the reader can read only the information embedded into the tag, it may not be able to gather too much information from the receiver. RFID tags are a good choice where authorization of some kind is required to verify whether the receiver is authorized to proceed or not. For instance, libraries implement RFID-based systems to check out books. A few countries follow a similar process by embedding RFID tags into the passports containing the traveler's information.

Bluetooth

Bluetooth technology was invented in 1994, and since then, it has been used today in most devices to establish connections and transfer data. Named after the 10th-century Danish King, Bluetooth devices use radio waves to communicate between two devices. These are short-range radio waves, so the two devices need to be closer physically.

However, an advantage of this arrangement is the low battery power consumption which is always a concern for users. Bluetooth devices detect each other when they are within the range. Out of the two devices, if capable, anyone can send a connection (or pair) request to establish a connection.

When IoT devices are embedded with Bluetooth, they generally act as only the senders, and no requests can be sent from the devices but only received from others. Once connected, data transfer can occur until the connection persists or the devices are in the defined range.

When it comes to IoT devices, the preferred modification of the conventional Bluetooth technology is Bluetooth Low Energy, also commonly referred to as BLE. This technology is optimized for IoT devices to conserve energy by putting the device to sleep until connection requests are encountered.

While having Bluetooth-enabled IoT devices is a great choice, the only downside is its short range. This brings down the range of devices it can cover within. However, if the requirement satisfies the usage of Bluetooth, such as in automobiles or speakers, Bluetooth would be the best and most optimum choice to make.

Wi-Fi

Wi-Fi is a very popular technology today used to browse the Internet through a router. The technology works wirelessly, giving access through a router connected directly to ISP. This connection can either be made through satellite dishes or optical fibers. The router then provides the access points through which other devices capable of Wi-Fi connectivity can connect to the device and access the Internet. Sometimes you may also find repeaters installed to increase the length of the range of Wi-Fi discovery. But that is based on requirements and is optional to include.

IoT devices today come with a Wi-Fi adapter to connect to the Wi-Fi router. This can be achieved through a mobile application generally developed by the same organization for their IoT devices. It will also contain features to explore the parameters and data related to the device. A device with Wi-Fi-enabled technologies works great, except they need constant Internet access through the access point, which may not always be possible. If there is a connection break in-between, the data streaming may stop, and we may lose the data forever if there are no storage devices.

To overcome this hindrance, Wi-Fi Direct technology is used where we eliminate the need for a router and the Internet to transfer data. Instead, we convert our mobile device to act as a router which can then be connected to IoT in a similar manner. Once connected, the data can be transferred directly through the waves without any third intermediate medium. It is faster, does not require the Internet, and introduces little latency.

LTE

What would be the primary choice in an IoT device when we need to connect it to the Internet and know that Bluetooth or Wi-Fi isn’t available? We use the same approach as used in the same situation by our cellular devices - to use a SIM card.

LTE technology works on a higher frequency band and aims to increase the network's coverage and speed. Based on the GSM/UMTS/EDGE technology that has been in use for more than 40 years, LTE simplifies the network architecture and introduces optimized modulations and digital signal processing methods to connect to the Internet.

Having an LTE-enabled IoT device is extremely common today because of its simplicity. It overcomes the need for a reader device as in RFID, high range and non-availability of a target device as in Bluetooth, and the need for a router with a dedicated network line in Wi-Fi. All we need is a SIM card inserted into the device (which can also be e-SIM), and the device can connect to the organization’s server. One of the most common examples of this usage is smart watches which do not need a connected device to receive and make voice calls.

Applications of IoT Devices

A couple of decades back, IoT devices used to be a luxury as the components involved in their manufacturing were expensive, and not everybody had access to the Internet back then. Not to mention that the technological world was new, and people had their doubts about using something like a sensor.

Today, all of those have changed significantly. Everybody trusts and opts for technical devices (thanks to so many tech inventions), have great exposure to the Internet (thanks to the efforts of millions), and the components have become much cheaper. All these changes have opened the gates to other domains which organizations have started to develop IoT devices for. Since they have so many benefits, today, we can see IoT devices all around us widening the areas to which this technology can be applied. The following high-level areas are the ones where we get the maximum involvement of IoT devices today:

Smart Devices

Smart devices would probably be the most common interaction of people with IoT devices that may belong to all ages from birth (like baby monitors connected by Wi-Fi) to the elderly with smartwatches to track their health. A smart device is an electronic gadget that can connect to other devices or a network by the technologies described above. The sub-categories of smart devices can be many and are generally used in regular objects—for example, watches, speakers, refrigerators, smart doorbells, etc.

Health Care

A domain that has seen a significant rise in IoT-based applications, especially after the COVID pandemic, is health care. While health care consists of hospitals and emergency medical assistance, it also means the normal small health care devices that help keep various parameters in check. These handheld devices can perform tests on patients in the comfort of their homes.

Since a healthcare domain involves a lot of types of people, we may find IoT devices developed just for them from various manufacturers and software organizations. These can be summarized as follows:

• Patient-specific devices: This includes the devices such as wearable bands to monitor a specific parameter where the device is attached constantly.
• Hospital-specific devices: These devices are installed to maintain the hospital environment up to the standards and maintain hygiene. IoT devices in hospitals also monitor humidity, temperature, and pollution inside the compartments to ensure the patient isn’t affected. Outside the patient area, hospital-specific IoT devices can be used in managing pharmacy inventories, refrigeration control, and maintaining a certain number of doctors in the hospitals at any given time.
• Health insurance: Insurance fraud is a major setback for insurance companies. When health is concerned, if the hospital or an individual could claim with false documents, there is no other way to find out whether the person was sick or not. But thanks to IoT devices connected to patients, we constantly monitor their parameters. Insurance companies now analyze these parameters to release the claim and understand whether the claim is genuine. As a result, health insurance frauds in 2021 were less than 28.7% compared to 2017 - report.
• Automobile: As we discussed at the beginning of this IoT testing tutorial, automobiles come equipped with IoT devices such as tire pressure monitoring systems. But if we dig a little deeper and list down the IoT devices installed in an average car, it is surprising to see that such vehicles are loaded with sensors.

An automobile organization today requires research in the automobile department and IoT, from air conditioning control to automatic headlights to rain-sensing systems. A specific feature of automobiles is called a “connected car” that transmits data to the OEM’s cloud servers up to 200 MBs per day by automobile. This is then analyzed by manufacturers for further research areas.

• Home automation: Connecting most appliances with your mobile phone today is not a fantasy idea. Organizations have been pushing to introduce IoT-based technologies into their electrical appliances to provide comfort to the user.

When everything is connected, the whole ecosystem is termed “home automation.” This varies depending on the type of appliance we are using. Light bulbs today come with a connection to Wi-Fi that can be controlled with our mobile devices to change the color of light thrown by bulbs. Air-conditioners, as another example, can also be connected to Wi-Fi that you can turn on when you are on your way home.

There are innumerable examples of this domain, and new inventions are popping up daily. This could result from high user adoption, a huge market size, and high growth projections estimated by various firms.

• Agriculture: For someone who works closely with IoT research and innovations, you may find that most of the focus for inventors has been agriculture. It may be due to the saturation of home automation and smart devices. But the agriculture field provides a larger area to work on with conventional manual work that is tedious, hectic, and not so efficient.

The first example is monitoring crops through sensor-based devices. These sensors collect various parameters such as temperature during a range of days, humidity, moisture in the soil, growth parameters of the crop, etc. Once these parameters are collected, they are sent to the backend, where an algorithm assesses and tells the farmer if they need to do anything differently or extra.

This whole system can enhance crop productivity and detect any early diseases to save a lot of bucks and hard work of the farmer. However, this is just the start of IoT implementation in the crop monitoring ecosystem. A lot of advancement is happening, including integrating artificial intelligence.

The second application in agriculture is to harvest the crop directly through robotics and IoT-enabled devices. At frequent intervals, the device can be triggered to spray the liquid (pesticide or water) without manual intervention.

Apart from these most popular application areas, IoT devices can also be used in areas such as environmental protection, access control, or enhancing customer experience when they connect to your company number.

What is IoT Testing?

All the sections of this IoT testing guide above explore various angles of an IoT device. They also make it extremely clear that IoT devices work with a lot of responsibility, the failure of which can create a chain event. For instance, a simple sensor failure in an automobile can stop the car immediately if it starts to give faulty values.

This forces us to move a step back and introduce one more step between research/manufacturing and selling it to the end customer (or business in B2B formats). This step is to perform IoT testing of these devices.

IoT testing provides a comprehensive approach to validating the practical and non-functional requirements of IoT solutions. As a result, you will deliver safer solutions and, therefore, be more attractive to your customers.

Why perform IoT testing?

IoT testing of devices opens up a lot of vulnerabilities, out of which many are hidden and are not noticeable at first glance. However, their effect can be witnessed if passed to the end-users, which is not good for business. If we collect these lists of advantages, we get the following lists:

Explores security issues

Where there is a connected Internet network, there are chances of hacking it and retrieving the information to a third-party server. While it is a threat to any device, it becomes more of a priority because of the sensitive information IoT devices deal with.

For instance, what if someone intervenes in CCTV cloud transfer and removes their entry into the building? Or what if someone could retrieve all the information from the network of a hospital's IoT devices and mine that data for other hospitals or draw patterns for third-party organizations?

IoT and Internet-based issues are susceptible, and when performing IoT testing, we should never ignore security testing. Ethical hackers can help close all the backdoors and make the network safe and secure.

Build trust among customers

IoT testing ensures no device failures on the user’s side. Usually, when we deal with IoT devices, they are not so easy to install in the first place. Depending on the location and the type of device, it can take a lot of effort just to get started. If such a device breaks, the customer needs to repeat the process, which will cost him more time.

Due to this, we lose the customer's trust and all those who will consult him for their usage. IoTs perform critical operations often dealing daily with data, and therefore we need to build reliability among customers, which comes from efficient IoT testing.

Helps in business growth

A direct consequence of having a quality product that does not fail and is reliable in customers' eyes is an increase in sales and growth in business. So IoT testing directly relates to the revenue a business generates. We can have fewer features in our product, but whatever we have should work without errors.

Data consistency

IoT testing includes testing the data collection and cleaning mechanism done at the front and back end. If there is an error in this process, we may draw wrong patterns that can drive the business in the wrong direction. This could be economically fatal, and IoT testing ensures this does not happen at the user’s end.

Helps in curating business strategies

Finally, IoT testing means testing the outer part of the device and whether the algorithms we use are correct. This may require some manual work as well. For instance, we collect data successfully, clean it, mine it, and draw some patterns, such as 80% of users use the XYZ feature daily. At this point, we can manually verify this number and ensure the patterns are correct. If they are, they will be used to curate business strategies and build a plan for future releases.

So, when performing IoT testing, we ensure each angle of the device and verify its working. This requires multiple testing techniques and strategies mentioned in the below sections of this IoT testing tutorial.

Components of IoT Testing

When we start with IoT testing, it needs to be prepared a little differently because of the involvement of source device hardware, unlike software testing, which considers only target device hardware. We may need a few things on top of software testing for this. This can be considered a prerequisite for IoT testing.

IoT Device

To perform IoT testing, the first thing we need is an IoT device which is the final release version that will go on to the end-user.

Configured Server

The second thing we need is a completely configured server to be used with the IoT device. Generally, most IoT devices like to use the Internet today due to the accessibility it provides to the end-user. However, remember that the server should be configured but not connected to the device yet. Otherwise, we may not be able to test how well a server will receive a new IoT device or a different IoT device (which obviously should not connect).

Live Network

Finally, we need the network already established and ready to be connected. The type of network depends on the type of IoT device. If the device is BT (Bluetooth) enabled, we may need a third device with BT technology. If the device is LTE enabled, then a SIM card or a Wi-Fi connection. Also, make sure at this point to note the server's response to a new network connection request.

Frameworks

Once the components are ready that the end-user will use directly, we need to focus on the testing-specific components. We may require a framework that can perform IoT testing like JMeter or simulations like Bevywise.

Scripting

Finally, we require scripting knowledge in the language supported by the framework. While the wave of no-code solutions has been gripping other elements in testing, IoT testing currently works on scripted solutions only. This should also remain the case because too many sensitive elements are involved, and making the entire testing area codeless may leave a couple of holes here and there.

Types of IoT Testing

The benefits mentioned above can only be reaped if the IoT testing of the device is done correctly. To achieve that, we need to focus on multiple areas through multiple testing paradigms that will help explore defects in various directions. This section of the IoT testing tutorial highlights the most important testing types required to be performed as part of the IoT testing process.

Regulatory Testing

IoT devices are hardware physical objects that will be installed physically. So, like every hardware physical object (a good example is a dashcam for automobiles), it needs to pass regulatory checks to be labeled as fit for use. This will depend on various countries; unfortunately, there are no universal standards.

For instance, in the United States, you might have to pass FCC (Federal Communications Commission) regulations. Still, in India, you will have to submit the device for TEC (Telecommunication Engineering Centre) regulations.

Regarding regulatory testing, every organization would unarguably consider this type of testing as the most important part of the complete testing phase. This is because if regulations are incompatible with the device, it does not matter how good it is or how many beneficial functions it has. It won’t be allowed to be sold in that particular country. A second submission would take time, effort, and costs. So, to avoid this, in regulatory testing, we ensure that our device checks all the points in regulations and the business is not hindered.

Security Testing

Once we have ensured that regulations are met, we move on to the second most important type of testing - checking the security loopholes of the device. IoT devices are connected through a network. This connection can be compromised, and all the data can be leaked to a third-party server.

If we consider the recent high usage of IoT devices, it is quite evident that today we transfer highly sensitive information in a lot of places, including data metrics and imagery. But interestingly, security testing has not been a focal point for most organizations.

This was obvious by the number of devices affected by Mirai and other malware targeting IoT devices - a case study.

So, what do we mean when we say IoT devices are vulnerable and require security testing? By this statement, we majorly consider the following pain points that are most affected and should be focused on when we perform security testing:

• Disabling software: Disabling the software can give access to attackers by creating a bypass of their own, providing an illusion of normal software execution. But in reality, the code will not raise any errors because of the tempering. For example, changing a branch instruction from “equal to” to “not equal to” can provide entry to every incorrect entry and can easily be used to gain access into the system when such a code is changed on the “password” fields.

  For electric vehicles, the code can be changed to adjust the current supply, which will shift the electric current comparatively in other appliances and cause damage to each device connected inside the home.

  Such situations can cause security issues that are not so easy to point out.

• Eavesdropping: As the name suggests, an eavesdropping attack tries to get the data from the middle, trying to portray itself as the authentic element of the network. Due to this nature, this type of attack is also called a “Man In The Middle” attack (abbreviated as MITM attack).

  A similar attack was witnessed by Fitbit, where the attackers followed a process to sniff the usage statistics transferred by the devices to the Fitbit servers.

  Below is the diagram you can follow to know the steps taken for this attack.

  

  This generally happens when the data is not encrypted correctly (or at all) while communicating with the servers. For a tester, it is crucial to test the encryption part to save their data from leaking out to a third party without knowing for a long time.

• Node tampering :It is a manual attack method in which the hacker manually changes any node component. This node component can be replicated or the same component can be copied to another device for server access. The tampered component depends on the information the hacker would want to retrieve.

One such attack was faced by the Itron Centron CL200 Smart Meter. The hackers wanted to change the “Device ID” of the smart meter. Once they found out that the device ID was embedded in the EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory) chip, they replicated the ID to be controlled by the attacker later on at any time. The attack was later revealed by checking the device's energy consumption:



Notice that the ID is the same for two devices but the power consumption varies greatly. From this log, we can reveal that the hacked device is responsible for energy theft by the attackers. Such hardware devices that control sensitive information should be made hack proof, and the testers should ensure that any tempering may lead to instant intimation to the organization using it or the one selling it. If we take this example, EEPROM can be saved using anti-counterfeit hardware primitives like PUFs (Physical Unclonable Functions).



• Code injection: One of the most popular security threats IoT users fear is malicious code injection. In this attack, the attacker injects malicious code into the IoT device through exposed holes in the software or hardware. This can be done either by hijacking the network or manually.

  The most famous case study is when it was performed on Google’s Nest Thermostat. The attackers took advantage of the vulnerable areas of Google Nest when “hard reset” was done. This complete full-proof attack included injecting a boot image, SSH server with root access, and attacker’s login with root privileges. This was done by resetting Google Nest and injecting images through a USB stick. Once done, the attackers could control the device through the Internet as they had access to the device with full authority.

  While these are some popular and famous methods to attack an IoT device, there are other common methods. These include gaining authorization in some way and getting access to user login through various mechanisms including phishing or exploiting the hardware directly. All of these issues can create a lot of financial trouble for the manufacturer and the user.

  A lot of IoTs deal with personal and sensitive data. Hacking a camera located inside the house can cause serious and legal considerations for the organization. The main motive for keeping this section long is to realize how such attacks happen and how to avoid such exploitation. This also explores how important a security testing phase is and should be done extremely cautiously.

Functional Testing

In the simplest of ways, functional testing can be defined as testing the IoT device to verify its functioning. In other words, all the functions the developers have implemented should work as intended. This can be achieved by combining the following types of testing that focus on different aspects of the device:

• Unit testing: The first stage is unit testing which the developers perform. This type of testing focuses on smaller units of the IoT device or its basic individual components. For instance, a camera can do many things, but just testing the recording part in isolation would come in unit testing.
• Integration testing: Next, we integrate all these units or individual components to test how the combined unit works. This unit is also called the integrated unit of the device.
• Interface testing: Then we move on to the graphical part to test if the interface functions work well. The interface testing part includes everything “visible” to the user. For instance, the mobile application is connected to the device.

  These applications will have various functionalities that can be accessed by interacting with the interface. Verifying these functionalities and the values shown by the interface is what a tester would do in this part of testing.

• End-to-end testing: As the name suggests, end-to-end testing focuses on the entire application flow when a user interacts. This can be tested by operating the application from the beginning to the end state.

  Since there can be multiple end states, all of those need to be tested and documented for future analysis. This type of testing is critical as the user could explore even a single left-out state and create a security issue in IoT devices.

• Regression testing: Once the IoT device is developed, manufactured, sold, and installed, it still receives updates. These updates include bug fixes, blocked loopholes, and security upgrades. It is essential that while these new fixes are being installed, they do not affect the fixes already in place. This fact is confirmed by running the regression tests with the newly developed code and ensuring everything will work as before.

Data Testing

According to a report, in 2019, 17.3 Zettabytes of data were produced from IoT devices. This number is expected to reach more than 73 ZB by 2025, when more than 20 billion devices will be connected as IoT. The magnitude of this number cannot be overlooked when conducting IoT testing. Given the substantial volume of data being generated, and our utilization of it to drive business growth, it is imperative to ensure the accuracy of all the data being generated.

This is verified through data testing. As part of data testing, we are not concerned much about the algorithms and data quality. This is generally a part of big data testing. In this part, we just need to know whether our IoT transfers the correct data. If that is not the case, we may need to test the cause of the defect, which most probably would be the hardware. Data accuracy ensures that the patterns we draw in the future through our servers help us understand the customers and the customers do not get faulty data.

Usability Testing

An IoT device is made for a specific target audience. It can be for an organization, or it can be for individuals with diverse backgrounds. For an organization, we generally do not need usability testing as a small seminar can suffice the training and learning. However, if the device is for anybody who orders it, usability testing ensures that when the device is installed, the user has no trouble using its features.

Usability testing involves real users who are not provided with any hints about the device or its functions, simulating the experience of a real end-user. The users are observed as they navigate and interact with the device, and their actions are carefully documented to gain insights into user behavior. If testers identify instances where users struggle to understand or locate certain features, this feedback is incorporated, and improvements are made accordingly.

Performance Testing

The performance testing of an IoT device determines the performance parameters that are not part of the functional testing—for instance, scalability, speed of various components, workload behavior, etc. Performance testing helps evaluate the non-functional side of efficiency, which is equally important in current times. If the device does not load faster, even if it performs functionally well, the end user might still provide negative feedback.

Compatibility Testing

Finally, when it comes to IoT devices, we need to perform compatibility testing that ensures the compatibility of devices with other devices. Since we may not know what device our IoT will be connected to at the end user's point, we should ensure to list down the benchmark values for the same.

For instance, if you have performed compatibility testing, then we can state that you need Android version 8.0 and Bluetooth 4.0 or higher to connect. This helps in documentation, and it's easier for the user to understand the compatibility issues.

These IoT testing types are sufficient to ensure that the IoT device being sent to the customer can perform all the intended functions correctly. Once these things are clear, we can progress toward setting up the IoT testing processes.