Internet and Human Capability: A Study In Parallel Evolution

Evolution is a funny thing. All organic creatures evolve in response to changes in their environment. And then in turn, the environment changes in response to new behaviors from the organisms that inhabit it. The same dynamic applies to the Internet and the people who use it. Innovation begets behavioral change. Behavioral change inspires new innovation.

But what happens when pace of environmental change begins to outpace human change? What happens when the Internet experiences such massive new strains on it from an exponential increase in the data, applications and interactions that have grown so dependent on it? And what must the industry do to prepare the network for this shift and ensure people can continue to take advantage of emerging technological capabilities?

The changes in our digital environment are stunning. According to the research firm Telegeography, global Internet capacity has reached 77 Tbps, more than doubling between 2010 and 2012. A lot of this growth is driven by the popularity of social media and high-bandwidth apps such as video. With Cisco predicting that there will be more than 50 billion connected devices in the world by 2020 (embed live counter from this page), how can we ensure that the global connectivity infrastructure can cope under this strain?

What has been discussed less is the increased unpredictability in network needs. This is not simply a question of network capacity, but of how we connect with our technologies as a species. Managing a reliable global utility requires a continual dedication to configuration data and infrastructure management. Without that, trust in the utility is not possible.

The Internet of Things will present similar challenges for all who are involved in creating it, as the reliability of physical objects, vehicles and even human wearables and cybernetics takes on a whole new meaning. When a computer crashes, you can reboot. What happens when a network outage impacts personal belongings, vehicles or body parts? Thats why the Internet must be built on a solid network, because any faults could have consequences far more serious than any we have yet imagined.

From a security point of view, the key challenge is controlling access to billions of devices on the network. How do you protect the devices from attacks when at the same time you need to ensure that the devices have configuration enabled? How do you control access with devices such as pace makers or vehicle steering systems that cannot be switched off?

You also need to ensure that you have the right building blocks, including configuration data and infrastructure management, in place. You need robust platforms to ensure that the network is protected against the unexpected. Connectivity involves context and automation and with data there are often ripples when something goes wrong. For example, if 100,000 devices kick off an action, this can quickly impact the whole network due to the huge number of connected devices. Policing the interaction between the devices is key to ensuring that the whole network is protected.

Good security isnt cheap, and you must also make security controls flexible enough so connectivity retains agility. Any issues with software bugs or network mal-performance will be amplified with the Internet of things. Its up to service providers to deliver these mechanisms and policies, and the industry needs to recognize it.

All this leads us to some interesting new questions questions that shift our attention from supporting the network for the networks sake to supporting the network for humans sake. How do you balance the evolution of the Internet with the evolution of how people use technology?

Its true that technology now evolves faster than human behavior. And yet, human imagination is an infinite resource, whereas network capacity is not. This two-way tension raises some interesting questions:

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Internet and Human Capability: A Study In Parallel Evolution