Robotics and Blockchain at the Forefront of Digitized Healthcare: IEEE

IEEE, the world’s largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for humanity, today concluded its virtual roundtable focused on how technologies like robotics and blockchain are driving transformation in the healthcare sector. With the pandemic emphasizing the importance of digital healthcare, IEEE curated this roundtable to discuss how the healthcare industry in India has long been faced with multiple challenges and the role of technology in addressing them.

During the roundtable, Jayakrishnan T, IEEE Member and Founder & CEO, ASIMOV Robotics Pvt. Ltd., said, “Post-pandemic social behavior has opened up several opportunities in the healthcare robotics domain such as telemedicine and remote management of outpatients. Moreover, contactless dispensing of food, medicine, and consumables have been made possible with the help of AMR and guided robots, concurrently the logistics and supply chain management within hospitals have minimized human interventions.”

According to a recent report by The Internet and Mobile Association of India,  the pandemic has accelerated the growth of the Indian health tech industry. It is expected to touch $5 billion by 2023 and is also likely to see a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 39%. A recent IEEE study of chief information officers (CIOs) and chief technology officers (CTOs) in the U.S., U.K., China, India and Brazil also revealed that Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, followed by 5G and IoT will be the most important technologies in 2021 – 18% of the respondents feel that the healthcare industry will be impacted by these technologies.

 “Affordability and scalability are the two major factors that would enable the use of robotics in India. There are indeed very promising use cases that can bring down operational costs significantly and reduce risks. Not only this, but robots on duty 24x7 will also substantially reduce the cost per patient to healthcare organizations and increase profitability,” On the other hand, providing robot as a service (RaaS) may be a better workable business model for India,” he further added.

 As the Indian healthcare industry transitions to a more patient-driven care delivery model, transformational changes that include affordable treatment and superior healthcare services using big data come with a huge cost for storing and processing. Moreover, given the rise in digital adoption, data privacy has emerged as a major concern that occurs primarily due to the mishandling of health records. This has led to erosion of trust in the current health regulatory practices that need to be addressed and taken seriously.

 Commenting on the same, Ramalatha Marimuthu, Senior IEEE Member said, “We can slowly overcome these challenges through increasing the infrastructure, technology and the number of users, thus dividing the cost between them. Recent blockchain algorithms are claiming to provide anonymity, where a generated address protects the real identity of the user. Moreover, shared databases have become a necessity thanks to the distributed nature of patient monitoring systems – the same patient suffering from multiple ailments will require treatments by various healthcare experts. This expertise may be available in different clinics or geographies and blockchain can ensure timely provision of healthcare through faster diagnosis, treatment, monitoring and thus personalized healthcare plans.”

 The COVID-19 pandemic has undoubtedly fast-tracked the adoption of digital solutions and advanced technology tools across sectors, especially in healthcare. The industry has largely realized that digital technologies must be an essential part of everyday processes, as organizations increasingly investing in social, mobile, analytics, and cloud technologies. The same survey of CIOs and CTOs from IEEE revealed that 55% of the respondents have accelerated adoption of cloud computing due to the pandemic. Therefore, fortifying digital architecture with a robust plan for a sustainable future is the need of the hour. While healthcare is a major concern today, it presents a huge opportunity to fast-track technology adoption in India.

How Sensors Monitor Bridges to

 How Sensors Monitor Bridges to Keep Us Safe

Vital to our infrastructure, bridges require regular maintenance to ensure safety for the cars, trucks, rails, and people regularly traversing them. Many bridges are 50 years or older, with citizens travelling across structurally deficient bridges every day.

“Structural health monitoring of bridges clarifies which repairs need to be prioritised,” says IEEE Senior Member Clint Andrews. “The deferred maintenance backlog has become so severe that it is easy to just throw up your hands and invest opportunistically in repairs, but the proper way is to prioritize based on the timely status information.”

Technologists are utilizing sensors and other smart technologies to monitor and protect our bridges and from irreparable damage to the infrastructure or the people involved if a structure collapsed.

While sensors are being used to detect early warnings of a catastrophic structural failure, they are also gathering important data about necessary structural repairs after a natural weather event like an earthquake or hurricane.

“In terms of civil management, the wireless sensors are commonly used to monitor and report the physical condition of bridges, such as the slip-factor and humidity,” says IEEE Member Yidong Li. “Estimating traffic on different road segments would provide very useful information for further analysis and decisions that would be taken or generated by the system.”

Gathering this type of data is also helpful for city management, providing the public with real-time traffic conditions.

To create smart cities or Next-Generation Cities that are tech, citizen, and eco-friendly, solutions need to be super-efficient. Innovations like IoT and the use of sensor technology for waste disposal are a few instances. According to IBEF, India will be the third-largest market for construction by 2022.

Sensors are also used for emergency rescue situations in remote areas. “If there’s an emergency condition on the roadside and emergency services can’t be reached nearby due to a lot of traffic, in this scenario, emergency vehicles can be triggered automatically through the connection of nearby wireless sensors sharing location details of the spot to those services,” explains IEEE Senior Member Aiyappan Pillai.

 

HOW DO SENSORS PROTECT BRIDGES?

 

A wireless sensor device, also known as a wireless sensor node, has a sensing unit connected to a processing unit, a communication unit and a power unit. The sensor will also have storage memory.

“The sensing unit may include one or many sensors for data acquisition of any physical phenomena of interest, such as temperature, humidity, strain and acceleration. There is also a signal conditioning unit, which incorporates an analog-to-digital converter (ADC) unit for converting the analog signals,” says Li. “The processing unit is the main controller of the node. It is responsible for managing the wireless sensor node operations, including sensing and wireless communication. It generally consists of an on-board computer (i.e. a microcontroller unit) with processing and data storage capabilities.”

“When we monitor bridges, we apply a large number of sensor nodes to formulate a wireless sensors network (WSN) and the sensors formulate data acquisition subsystems,” Li adds.

Therefore, to support the smooth functioning of bridges, it is essential to have sensor technologies and city management will only further help in providing a personalized experience for the city's businesses and people.

How Artificial Intelligence Is Helping Fend Off

 How Artificial Intelligence Is Helping Fend Off Cyberattacks 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the ability of technology to think and act like a human and is being utilized to help fight off potential cyberattacks. Employing AI and machine learning to detect vulnerabilities significantly enhances human capabilities, as AI can analyze and report millions of cyberthreats in the time it might take a person to do the same. 

AI can get “smarter” and “learn;” as an AI algorithm continues to search and monitor data, it can improve its understanding of diverse types of potential attacks. 

According to a study by PwC and Data Security Council titled "Cyber Security India Market: What lies beneath", Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) will be powering the 'cyber war rooms' in organisations to help them protect from increasing cyberattacks, as well as detect, predict and respond to the same. 

WHAT IS A CYBERATTACK? 

You have heard a lot about cyberattacks and data breaches on the news lately, but what exactly is a cyberattack and why is it important to protect our data? 

“In short, a cyberattack is a deliberate and often targeted attempt to mount an action via or against digital technology,” says IEEE Senior Member Steven Furnell. “In practice, cyberattacks can take many forms, but we tend to most commonly associate things like hacking and malware, and perhaps phishing. However, there is a far broader range of labels that can be used to reflect the specific approaches and motivations that may be involved.”

“After the attack, the computer or the network will be destroyed, exposed, modified or lose some functions,” adds IEEE Senior Member Guangjie Han. “And your personal information or important data will be acquired by someone else without authorization. Consider the potential benefit behind the data — that’s why these attacks exist.” 

Junior hackers might only have an interest in stealing money, acquiring personal data or merely for the joy of hurting others. More senior hackers have the potential to breach entire companies or governments. 

HOW AI PRIORITIZES SECURITY NEEDS 

Once AI has effectively identified the potential risks and threats, the next step is to prioritize what gets addressed and in what order. 

“Since AI-based detection systems usually work with uncertainty, they are useful not only to raise alerts when something seems to be wrong but also to give a score on how close a given event is from a cyberattack,” says IEEE Member Marcos Simplicio. “Events with higher scores can then be prioritized accordingly. For example, above a certain score, automated measures may be taken to stop the highly probable attack without any human intervention. Events with a lower score can then be forwarded to administrators for further analysis, and some events with low scores may be simply logged without any additional action, since handling them may not be worth the effort.” 

OTHER METHODS OF STOPPING CYBERATTACKS 

AI and machine learning are not the only mechanisms used to prevent and fight off cyberattacks. A wide range of robust technologies protect our systems and help fend off severe breaches. 

IEEE Senior Member Aiyappan Pillai explains that in addition to AI, cryptography, emerging quantum cryptography, analytics, IoT security, blockchain security and hardware authentication technologies are also helping technologists keep our digital infrastructure secure. 

Lastly, another way to prevent cyberattacks is continuing to educate users to stay away from suspicious activity. “It is important to remember that security is largely a matter related to processes and behaviors and therefore administrative, education and awareness processes play a key role in any well-designed security strategy,” stresses IEEE Senior Member Raul Coucher. 

Zero Trust network will be key to

 Zero Trust network will be key to achieving cybersecurity resilience: IEEE

IEEE, the world’s largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for humanity, today concluded its virtual roundtable focused on how cybersecurity will be an integral part in the next normal, powering the future workplace. With the pandemic bringing a paradigm shift in the way we work, IEEE curated a roundtable to discuss the tenets of cybersecurity and how it will be an important aspect for individuals and businesses to establish a strong IT foundation in these rapidly changing environments.

 

During the roundtable, Senior IEEE Member and Founder, Congruent Services, Aiyappan Pillai said, “Industry and society at large have embraced digital as a key enabler across all facets and domains of activity. The boundaries of the “digital estate” have become variable. As critical digital resources are not confined to a physical location, new policies, protocols and technologies are required to ensure cybersecurity.”

 

 In a recent survey of Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and Chief Technology Officers (CTOs) in the U.S., U.K., China, India and Brazil, the top two concerns for CIOs and CTOs when it comes to the cybersecurity of their organization are security issues related to the mobile workforce, including employees bringing their own devices to work (37%).

 

“Adopting a zero-trust security architecture could help manage cybersecurity incidents by the reduction in the attack surface. This multi-layer approach would entail new security protocols that every digital citizen should embrace, even if slightly inconvenient. The new challenges throw up many opportunities in cybersecurity. It is a mainstream requirement of any organization and hence the need for cybersecurity professionals is expected to grow,” he further added.

 

Though cloud and internet are core infrastructure prone to DDoS attacks, there is greater focus on cybersecurity by service providers due to mission criticality. Vulnerabilities due to human beings - both inadvertent and intentional - are more challenging to defend. While installation of reputed anti-malware/ anti-virus / anti-ransomware software on end devices is essential, it is equally important to raise the awareness of each digital citizen on cybersecure practices. 

Commenting on the same, Bala Peddigari, Senior IEEE Member said, “Digital technologies convergence has transformed the customer experience and opened many vulnerabilities for industries to look and face upon. Today, we see organization of every shape and size significantly invest in cybersecurity, keeping time as a major essence. As the organization are working in remote manner due to current pandemic situation across the globe, elimination of perimeter, AI, multitude of technologies, modern workplace, lack of security awareness and reactive methods are some of the key factors influencing the cyber risk landscape.”

The pandemic has demonstrated the power of digital enablement and people are embracing it at different levels. As the issues of cybersecurity have been accentuated during the pandemic, there is an awareness regarding the need to secure data as well as system integrity. It is expected that the Healthcare & BFSI industries will give extreme importance to cybersecurity, as they go digital in a big way. The IEEE members underlined the need to invest in cybersecurity measures for a better, connected future and Zero Trust will be of utmost importance to take industries to greater heights.

New age Robots will be an inevitable part of

 New age Robots will be an inevitable part of Industry 4.0: IEEE

IEEE, the world’s largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology for humanity, today concluded its virtual roundtable focused on how immersive technologies like Robotics & AI will be the driving force in India. With the post-pandemic scenario dawning upon us, IEEE curated a roundtable to discuss how these cutting-edge technologies are crucial for businesses, associations and societies to establish a strong foundation in these rapidly changing environments.

 

During the roundtable, Senior IEEE Member and CEO, ASIMOV Robotics Pvt. Ltd, Jayakrishnan T said “Robotics will play a pivotal role in Industry 4.0 revolution. The new world order has not only expedited the development of health-tech, but also has influenced technology solutions across sectors.”

 

During the last decade, the evolution of robotic capabilities was exponential. According to the International Robotic Federation (IRF) report, India has moved up one position to now feature among the top 10 countries with the most annual installations of robots in industries.

 

Adding to this Jayakrishnan said “With the accelerated pace of automation adoption, robotics will transform the world by the introduction of digital work force in combining the major game changers - Computer simulation, AR VR, Rapid prototyping, Collaborative robots, Big data analysis, AI, IOT, High speed internet and Cloud computing.”

 
The roundtable also highlighted how AI is opening new fronts in Healthcare and is fueling predictive and prescriptive analytics to help increase efficiencies across sectors. A recent IDC study revealed that India's AI spending will grow at 30.8% CAGR to nearly ₹6,490.6 cr in 2023.

 

Commenting on the same, Sukanya Mandal, Senior IEEE Member said, “Among other immersive technologies, AI & ML play critical role in helping businesses have an all-inclusive view of data, providing them a way to make connections. It’s not a matter of eliminating human intelligence and insight. In fact, in order to augment intelligence for businesses, the amalgamation of human intuition and machine intelligence is of utmost importance. Going forward, we will witness companies spending exponentially in intelligent solutions to drive and ensure business continuity, cutting across verticals.”

As the pandemic has influenced the direction of latest trends in all technology applications, it has become mandatory to maintain the new world order in every aspect of development. The COVID-19 outbreak has taught the world a number of lessons, one of the important one is to use technological innovation in its full potential. The IEEE members underlined the need to invest in new digital infrastructure, vital projects and innovate for a better tomorrow.