Q. We hear a lot of talk on security within the IoT. Recently I read about the hypervisor solution that has a focus on securing critical information and software. Could you elaborate?
A. Nothing is 100 per cent secure. However, there are a wide variety of capabilities built in to the hypervisor and protocol stack to handle security issues. Those are typically part of the specifications of the suppliers or original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), and these requirements are getting more rigorous every time. Security is important to us in more than just embedded software and hypervisor. It is important in the chips as well.
Q. Could you share an example of securing chips?
A. We have customers who are quite concerned that chips manufactured in a foreign country, for example, might have something added into them that the designer did not know about. So they want us to test the chips and verify that it only performs the specific operations that it had been originally designed for, and does not affect the output or use the signal for anything else. We do development programs in this area, we have basic kinds of software encryptions, but I think this is a very fruitful area.
Q. Is IoT and automotive a promising market, or will it be just a fad?
A. There is a large market for IoT in the automotive without even attacking what is the most difficult problem. We already have the first stage in high-end vehicles today; we have forward-looking radar to slow you down if you get too close to the car ahead. That is connectivity seeing the other car, but it is a safety addition that keeps you from running into the car. That is a long way from Google Car that has been driving now for three years without any accident. It can be done if we are willing to spend enough on electronics. There are hundreds of things you can do with IoT to make cars easier to drive, safer and less accident prone, before you make it driverless.
