IoT Limitations and Concerns Relative to 5G Architecture

Introduction

Many telco operators are already immersed in the deployment of the next generation of mobile networks, 5G. 5G networks not only offer enhancements and additional features compared to 4G and its predecessors, but it also disrupts the network infrastructure, enabling the development of innovative use cases and applications. 5G offers higher connection speeds up to 10 Gbps (ITU, 2017), lower latency and delay i.e. less than 10 ms (Raftopoulou et al., 2019), faster response times, very high capacity, the capability of supporting a hundred times more devices per cell (Marzetta, 2010), higher reliability of the communications, ubiquitous connectivity, and lower battery requirements for devices (Lauridsen et al., 2016).

All of these advancements are possible thanks to the introduction of a set of innovative schemes such as, (i) a brand new architecture that standardizes radio access networks and pushes cloud capabilities to the edge of the network (C-RAN); (ii) new high-frequency bands to support a higher throughput (Wang et al., 2014); (iii) massive Multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) to allow the transmission and reception of more than one signal concurrently over the same channel; and (iv) network slicing to provision dedicated virtual networks for specific applications and customers (Zhang et al., 2017).

One of the fields that will benefit more from the realization of 5G networks is the IoT. The limitations in terms of delay, throughput, and device density of current mobile networks are preventing many IoT applications to become a reality. Fortunately, all these limitations are solved in 5G networks. The low latency and high throughput of 5G networks will enable all the promises of industry 4.0 and e-health applications especially amid the critical experiencing Corona Virus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) (Bai et al., 2020); they will enable the deployment of smart cities with a high density of devices and sensors; the ubiquity of the connectivity and its high capacity will enable the promise of “full-remote” work for everyone. Moreover, 5G’s brand new architecture will better existing applications such as media streaming, and it will the door to the realization of brand-new mobile applications with high computational requirements based on Virtual Reality (VR)/Augmented Reality (AR) and Artificial Intelligence (AI).

All of the aforementioned applications will have an increasing impact in our post-COVID society, where automation will become significantly important (Ting et al., 2020); full-remote work will become the new normal; mobile networks, due to their distributed nature, will become a source of anonymous data collection and processing to prevent and avoid future pandemics (Zhai et al., 2020); and our daily basis will be increasingly digital (Porpiglia et al., 2020) with many of our daily tasks and social interactions supported by VR/AR and media communication. Despite its clear advantages, many have stated that the frequency bands used in 5G networks can spread COVID-19 (Davies, 2020), but the World Health Organization (WHO) quickly released a statement denying this because it is propagated through breathing droplets (WHO, 2020).

IoT can be simply defined as being a technology which connects an electronic device on and off the internet. Several devices can be connected to the internet so long as it is determined to have the capabilities and approaches to the connection. Example of these devices includes washing machines, cell phones, lamps, wearable devices, headphones, coffee makers, automated cars, and other products. Due to these connections, the technology creates people to people, people to things, and things to things relationships; and approximately 26 billion devices are expected to access the internet by the year 2020 under the influence of the growth of IoT technology (Weber, 2010).