u-blox IoT Security-as-a-Service offering

u-blox has announced the launch of its IoT Security-as-a-Service offering. Available on both the u-blox SARA-R4 and SARA-R5 series of LTE-M cellular IoT modules, the service makes it simple to protect data from malicious third parties, both on the device and during transmission from the device to the cloud. Its out-of-the box, simple and secure onboarding process to leading cloud IoT platforms should speed up development, shortening time to market.

The IoT Security-as-a-Service offering, which is managed via the u-blox Thingstream service delivery platform, is specifically optimised for low-power wide-area (LPWA) deployments that use resource-constrained IoT devices. By reducing data overhead and keeping the number of handshakes to a minimum, the service should improve power consumption and extend the battery life — a critical metric for IoT devices.

Through a symmetric key management system (KMS), an infinite number of crypto keys can be generated on the fly for each device, rather than having to rely on the storage and management of pre-shared keys. Keys are tied to the hardware and can be triggered from either the module or from the server/cloud, eliminating the need to create, deliver and renew certificates and reducing operational complexity and power consumption.

The solution also leverages u-blox’s Foundation security offering, which comprises fundamental elements that make SARA-R4 and SARA-R5 modules secure by design. These include a unique and immutable device identity that is tied to its root of trust (RoT), which forms the basis for the security functionality, including a secure boot mechanism that ensures that the module can only run trusted software. In addition, the company’s uFOTA feature enables authentication of over-the-air firmware updates.

The offering is a true end-to-end concept that protects data from the device to the end user without making it visible to intermediate nodes or platforms, or to service providers. With straightforward onboarding to cloud IoT platforms, efforts are not taken up by security concerns and operational complexities. Relevant use cases include asset tracking, connected health/e-health, industrial monitoring, building and home automation, telematics, and smart metering.