Starting from this month’s edition, the Team @ News Hub will be periodically inviting guest writers to contribute to our e-publication. We’re glad to be featuring Prof Alexei Dingli as our first guest contributor.

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, a toaster decided that it had had enough of making toast, so it went surfing.

No, this is not a children’s fairytale, but rather something which happens every day around the world to smart toasters. Such toasters connect to the internet, surf the web for updates and also allow their owners to control them remotely. Welcome to the world of the Internet of Things (IoT).

The idea behind IoT is to create devices (such as toasters, fridges, ovens, lightbulbs, doors, cars, etc.) with the capability of connecting to the internet and transferring or receiving data over a network without requiring human interaction. The value of the global IoT market was $200 million in 2019, but it is expected to reach the $1.6 billion mark in the coming five years.

IoTs have a lot of applications, and the following are some examples:

• a washing machine uses IoTs to send diagnostic information to the manufacturer or to update its software;
• a coffee machine can start brewing the coffee as soon as its owner wakes up;
• a faulty light bulb might send a request to the ironmonger to deliver a new bulb to its current address;
• a user can track the location of his pet using a mobile application.

The list can go on forever since there are around 23 billion IoT devices worldwide. Of course, these are just some of the mundane usages, and one can find more complex examples which make use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) like the following:

• smart bins with IoT sensors inform the garbage collector to collect the garbage bin when full. Such a system ensures that the garbage bin doesn’t overflow and the collector only gathers it when it is getting full, thus saving time and money;
• smart parking sensors make use of IoT to inform drivers when a parking space is free. The effect of this is to reduce cruising time and also traffic, since people looking for a parking space account for more than 30% of traffic;
• smart manufacturers make use of IoT sensors to optimise their machines. Factories with hundreds of devices cannot effectively monitor those machines using only human operators. Because of this, they make use of IoT sensors to send real-time information about the well-being of the devices to an AI system which is capable of monitoring thousands of machines simultaneously and taking corrective action where appropriate;
• smart traffic monitoring uses an army of cameras and other IoT sensors to analyse the traffic of a country in real-time. The AI then decides to take action autonomously to ease the flow. These might include the switching of traffic lights, the changing of tidal lanes, etc.

If all of this sounds like science fiction, then I suggest you inform yourself about IoTs. All the smart devices mentioned earlier can be purchased online and installed in any house today. The four case studies which use IoT and AI have been implemented successfully somewhere near you. The leading mobile operators have already geared up for this new revolution, and their application is only limited to your imagination.

However, the possibilities of IoT are endless. In the coming years, we will experience more innovative applications.

• Connected cars will become the order of the day whereby the vehicle receives real-time information about the road network and suggests adjustments to its user. It might consider suggesting an alternate route due to an accident somewhere along the way. The car might also analyse the driving patterns of the user and raise an alert when it identifies dangerous driving.
• Shops and distributors will have all of their stock tagged with Radio Frequency IDs (RFIDs), thus making it easier to locate every item. Stocktaking will take mere seconds rather than days. Stolen items will become a thing of the past since shop owners can potentially track everything.
• Robots will become the farmers of the future — an army of IoT sensors and robotic arms capable of monitoring the entire farm with millimetre precision will help grow the crops and manage farm animals. Farming will become a science with incredible optimisation and accuracy, thus guaranteeing maximum yield to the farmer.
• Healthcare will also change forever since IoT sensors will be used to monitor patients 24/7 anywhere around the world. Glucose, heartbeat and asthma monitors (to name a few) are used to provide doctors with real-time information. AI systems will continuously monitor the patients and trigger alerts if any abnormality is detected. In so doing, patients can continue leading their normal life while being provided with quality healthcare but without being institutionalised.

As can be seen, the possibilities offered by IoTs are endless. The cost of the individual devices is also rather low, thus providing a low-cost entry point. However, the benefits are endless and range from simple automation to the use of complex AI.

In the end, it’s not just the toaster that’s going to surf the internet, but most of our household and industrial devices. Thanks to this, our world will change forever. It will become smarter, more efficient and much better for everyone.

Prof Alexiei Dingli is a Professor of AI at the University of Malta. He has been conducting research and working in the field of AI for more than two decades, assisting different companies to implement AI solutions. His work has been rated World Class by international experts and he won several local and international awards (such as those by the European Space Agency, the World Intellectual Property Organisation and the United Nations, to name a few). He has published several peer-reviewed publications and forms part of the Malta AI task-force which was set up by the Maltese government, aimed at making Malta one of the top AI countries in the world.