The Internet of Things (IoT) is a system of interrelated computing devices, mechanical and digital machines, objects, animals or people that are provided with unique identifiers and the ability to transfer data over a network without requiring human-to-human or human-to-computer interaction.

A Thing can be any natural or man-made object that is assigned an IP address and can transfer data over a network.  A dog that has a microchip implanted or a car that has built-in sensors to alert the driver when a car is too close to stop safely are good examples of a “thing” in the Internet of Things.

IoT has evolved from the convergence of wireless technologies, micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS), microservices and the internet. The convergence has helped tear down the silo walls between operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT), allowing unstructured machine-generated data to be analyzed for insights that will drive improvements.