The evolution of the connected car ecosystem

Only 3.2 billion of the world”s 7.3 billion people are connected to the internet, said Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer at #WebSummit. Computation power is expected to increase 10^6, disrupting user behavior.

By 2020, the connected car market is forecast to grow at a CAGR of 31%, as large players in the automotive industry have been investing in vehicle connectivity and smartphone integration. Newly incorporated features such as automatic crash notifications, semi-autonomous driving or enhanced safety are predicted to bring an annual income of $14 billion.

[inlinetweet prefix=”” tweeter=”@bitdefender” suffix=” #websummit”]Only 3.2 billion of the world”s 7.3 billion people are connected to the internet[/inlinetweet], said Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer at #WebSummit.

Following the continuous growth and global embrace of the internet of things by private consumers and organizations, this new model of mobility will represent the fastest growing sector due to the multiple business opportunities for collaboration between mobile, telecom and the automotive industries. In coming years, the automotive industry is expected to invest in integrated payments and video conference calls so the connected car can turn into a personal mobile space combined with a work space.

Technology has made cars, only a commodity 15 years ago, cool again in a positive, added-value transformation, explained Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Renault-Nissan Alliance, at WebSummit in Lisbon in a panel talk about mobility and how connected cars may soon become the new smartphone. Renault-Nissan Alliance have been working closely with a startup to move in this direction.

It”s not a matter of “if,” but of “when,” connected cars will dominate the market as this technology is more applied to also stimulate investments in big data and cloud computing. But consumers need to first trust the technology and, with recent IoT-botnet hacks, manufacturers have a lot of work to do, and governments need to come up with regulations. IoT security is a challenge for both industries and governments, especially when trying to build a universal, international infrastructure policy.

As Ghosn pointed out, there are a lot of advantages for consumers and the automotive industry, but for now there is not 100 percent reliability in the technology, even though 90 percent of car accidents are a direct cause of human error. Considering humans are the weakest link and that most security breaches result from human error, consumers are also to blame for security fails as much as manufacturers.

PS: The Bitdefender team is at this year’s #WebSummit conference in Lisbon. If you’re around, drop by booth 749 to find out more about #IoT security for all connected devices.