At RIPE84, recorded at
https://ripe84.ripe.net/archives/video/782/Jad El Cham asks about training from the RIPE NCC on "IoT".
I watched this today from the archives. I wasn't able to be at the IOT-WG
meeting in person (yes, you saw me there on Monday), because I was at the IoT
Security Foundation's ManySecured WG meetings in London.
Perhaps that makes me more qualified to answer the question?
First, some nitpicks about this presentation. I couldn't hear Jad El Cham's
name very well, and the lack of slides meant I had to watch the video three
times to understand his question.
https://ripe84.ripe.net/programme/meeting-plan/iot-wg/has his name correctly, but:
https://ripe84.ripe.net/archives/#wednesday does *NOT*
If there were three slides with the questions and thoughts on them, then I
could far better respond to the question.
(Still not sure if the clapping for Marco leaving RIPE was ... "thanks for
all the work", or "thank god you escaped with your sanity...)
Second, while I share some of Jim's concern about scope creep, in fact there
are many things that the RIPE NCC is uniquely positioned to help with that
would benefit the community, and which probably *does* need a subsidy to get
done correctly. Profit motives being forever next-quarter, 90% of the IoT
security problems (as explained in the previous presentation, the slides at:
https://ripe84.ripe.net/presentations/87-HVIKT-IoT-encounters-ripe.pdf
include his missing slides...) are the result of next quarter thinking
combined with very poor operational controls.
If we are going to get a handle on the security issues with networks of
devices (routers are the Internet of Internet things) then we need more data
and more sharing of experiences. Back in RIPE79, (Rotterdam), I tried to
start discussion about how ISPs can collaborate better on dealing with
security issues, particularly DDoS caused by distributed malware.
So, what would I like to see:
1) increase connection with RIPE NCC with organizations like
iotsecurityfoundation.org. IoTSF is among the few places I've found which
are not about hype or marketing, who seem to have real connections to both
places/people technical and people/places regulatory. Like the IETF, though,
we need more participation of operators.... not just the airy-fairy senior
security architects from various ISPs, but actual people in the trenches.
There are dozens of interesting bits of research being done via RIPE Atlas,
telling more IoT types about the results would be a good thing. That could
be in the form of some RIPE (NCC?) person talking about research, or perhaps
for RIPE NCC sponsoring the researcher to present their stuff at a few
conferences, such as the IoTSF conference in October, but also IETF
meetings, RSA(*), Industrial Internet Consortium, The Thing Conference, ...
btw: I did two training courses in 2020 for IoTSF on default passwords and
software updates. *Manufacturers* are *really* hard to reach.
Educating *operators* about what to *ask for*, and which regulation the
supplier is not-complliant with when they fail, would also be very good.