Cities Face Challenges in an Interconnected World, CES Told
LAS VEGAS -- Most cities aren’t that “smart” yet and are struggling to keep on top of technology, CES was told. Localities face challenges securing vast amounts of data they receive in an interconnected world.
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Cities “really have a hard job” and are usually financially strapped, Mike Zeto, AT&T vice president-IoT advanced solutions, told a panel Thursday. Cities have had success when leadership asks technologists what they need, rather than dictate a platform, he said. Video can “cross all the silos” and spark interest across departments, he said. Fleet management is another such use, he said. AT&T creates end-to-end solutions, akin to a master systems integrator, he said. “It’s definitely going to take a village to get any kind of scale,” Zeto said: “There are still no cities that are really that damned smart. There are a lot of smart corridors, there are a lot smart projects, but it’s really, really hard to work.”
Municipalities should start pilots and get “their hands dirty,” said Ed Knapp, American Tower chief technology officer: “Just try something.” American Tower is focused on technology, like edge computing, he said. “That will help improve the response of certain applications and environments,” he said. “A lot of that leads to [cellular vehicle to everything] and automotive and the future of automotive.”
The FCC has tried to make it easier to deploy 5G, Knapp said. Mayors have issues to address and aren’t necessarily focused on fifth-generation wireless, he said: Cities want to control what’s deployed and remain concerned about aesthetics, he said: “There’s a balancing act.” Some cities are seeing success, Knapp said. “What we need to do is take those success stories, turn them into playbooks and then share … don’t reinvent the wheel,” he said: “When you do have a successful deployment of small cells in a city, what led to that success?”
AT&T is deploying 5G “anyway” and it will be available to cities, Zeto said: “We’ll have pervasive 5G, at the tower level, across the U.S. by mid-2020.”
FirstNet wants to give first responders tools everyone else uses. At CES, it's saying, “Hey cities, if you’re going to go smart, public safety is an important component," said Jennifer Harder, senior director-product. "Think about your first responders and how you’re equipping them to make the community function better.” FirstNet is encouraging apps and products that appeal to first responders, she said. “Public safety is an industry that you can leverage.” The authority is “looking at all the different ways that we can bring the smarts of CES’ community” to bear on public safety problems, she said.
During a second panel Thursday, speakers said the huge amount of data cities face and the growth of urban areas can be tough.
Sameer Sharma, Intel global general manager-smart cities and transportation, said it's an exciting time for technology, but the challenges are huge. Three million people move into urban areas weekly, Sharma said. “We are creating 50 new Chicagos every year.” Cities have to process 16.5 zettabytes of new data yearly, he said: That can fill 250 billion DVDs.
“The size of this data is going to keep increasing,” Sharma said: “This is not a future, decades-from-now phenomenon, it’s already happening.” Cities need to use all their tools, including artificial intelligence, edge computing, 5G connectivity and data-central capacity, he said. "Ultimately, it's about not that data but the insight." And all the many "devices are connected, they have compute capacity,” he said: “This is creating a very vast security attack surface.” Security has to be built in from the start, he said.
In the early stages of the IoT, everyone makes mistakes, said Ami Dotan, CEO of Karamba Security. "We’re talking about platforms that are safety-centric,” he said. “There is no time to deal with anomaly detection and remediation. … Everything is getting connected.” Municipalities face a data “tsunami,” he said.
“I’m seeing vulnerabilities now that were vulnerabilities 20 years ago,” said Alissa Knight, a former hacker who now works with industry to make systems safer. Companies are making “shocking mistakes” on the IoT. Security is a people issue, not a technology issue, she said. “We need to start placing more emphasis on secure coding,” she said: “The vulnerability is being created by us. We’re the problem.”
Municipalities large and small want to be smart cities, said Sokwoo Rhee, associate director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology Cyber-Physical Systems Program. About 19,000 cities and towns are in the U.S. and only 10 have a population of more than 1 million, Rhee said. “They all strive to become a smart city or smart town or smart community,” he said: “The problem is, the smaller a city, it becomes less attractive for private sector partners to work with them.” Companies say it’s hard to work with thousands of municipalities when one big one generates more revenue, he said: That adds to the “digital divide” and means many vendors miss opportunities.