Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions - Internet of Things : an action plan for Europe
Date: 2009-06-18
Institutions: European Commission
Subjects: Internet, computer systems, consumer protection, data protection, electronic commerce, information network, information technology, innovation, new technology

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COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES 

Brussels, 18.6.2009 
COM(2009) 278 final 

COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN 
PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL 
COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS 

Internet of Things — An action plan for Europe 

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COMMUNICATION FROM THE COMMISSION TO THE EUROPEAN 
PARLIAMENT, THE COUNCIL, THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL 
COMMITTEE AND THE COMMITTEE OF THE REGIONS 

Internet of Things — An action plan for Europe 

1. 

INTERNET OF THINGS: THE UMBRELLA FOR A NEW PARADIGM 

The  growth  of  the  Internet  is  an  ongoing  process:  only  twenty-five  years  ago  it  was 
connecting about a thousand hosts and has grown ever since to link billions people through 
computers  and  mobile  devices.  One  major  next  step  in  this  development  is  to  progressively 
evolve  from  a  network  of  interconnected  computers  to  a  network  of  interconnected  objects, 
from books to cars, from electrical appliances to food, and thus create an ‘Internet of things’1 
(IoT). These objects will sometimes have their own Internet Protocol addresses, be embedded 
in complex systems and use sensors to obtain information from their environment (e.g. food 
products that record the temperature along the supply chain) and/or use actuators to interact 
with it (e.g. air conditioning valves that react to the presence of people). 

The scope of IoT applications is expected to greatly contribute to addressing today’s societal 
challenges:  health  monitoring  systems  will  help  meet  the  challenges  of  an  ageing  society2; 
connected  trees  will  help  fight  deforestation3;  connected  cars  will  help  reduce  traffic 
congestion  and  improve  their  recyclability,  thus  reducing  their  carbon  footprint.  This 
interconnection of physical objects is expected to amplify the profound effects that large-scale 
networked  communications  are  having  on  our  society,  gradually  resulting  in  a  genuine 
paradigm shift.  

things-to-person  communication  and 

To complement this overview, it is worth noting three points that highlight the complex nature 
of  IoT.  First,  it  should  not  be  seen  as  a  mere  extension  of  today’s  Internet  but  rather  as  a 
number  of  new  independent  systems  that  operate  with  their  own  infrastructures  (and  partly 
rely on existing Internet infrastructures). Second, as detailed in a recent ISTAG report4, IoT 
will  be  implemented  in  symbiosis  with  new  services.  Third,  IoT  covers  different  modes  of 
communication: 
thing-to-thing  communications, 
including Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communication that potentially concerns 50-70 billion 
‘machines’, of which only 1 % are connected today5. These connections can be established in 
restricted areas (‘intranet of things’) or made publicly accessible (‘Internet of things’). 
The advent of IoT is taking place in an ICT environment  affected by several major trends6. 
‘Scale’  is  one  of  them:  the  number  of  connected  devices  is  increasing,  while  their  size  is 
reduced below the threshold of visibility to the human eye. ‘Mobility’ is another: objects are 
ever  more  wirelessly  connected,  carried  permanently  by  individuals  and  geo-localisable. 
‘Heterogeneity  and  complexity’  is  a  third  trend:  IoT  will  be  deployed  in  an  environment 

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6 

See the ITU 2005 report www.itu.int/dms_pub/itu-s/opb/pol/S-POL-IR.IT-2005-SUM-PDF-E.pdf or the 
ISTAG report ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/ist/docs/istagscenarios2010.pdf 
See for example www.aal-europe.eu/about-aal 
See for example — www.planetaryskin.org/ 
See ‘Revising Europe’s ICT Strategy’, — ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/ist/docs/istag-revising-europes-
ict-strategy-final-version_en.pdf 
This  figure  is  commonly  used  by  different  authors  who  assume  that  every  human  is  on  average 
surrounded by ~10 machines 
See COM/2008/0594 final — Future networks and the Internet 

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already crowded with applications that generate a growing number of challenges in terms of 
interoperability. 

The above examples show that the Internet of things can help to improve citizens’ quality of 
life,  delivering  new  and  better  jobs  for  workers,  business  opportunities  and  growth  for  the 
industry,  and  a  boost  to  Europe’s  competitiveness.  So  this  paper  dovetails  with  the  wider 
policy  initiatives  related  to  the  Lisbon  strategy  and  with  the  current  thinking  on  post-i2010 
initiatives7. The idea was first announced in the RFID communication8 and has since received 
input  from  the  RFID  Expert  Group9,  the  EESC10,  and  the  EU  Presidential  Conferences  of 
Berlin,  Lisbon  and  Nice11.  It  comes  in  response  to  the  invitation  made  by  the  Council12  to 
deepen  the  reflection  on  the  development  of  decentralised  architectures  and  promoting  a 
shared  and  decentralised  network  governance  for  the  Internet  of  things.  Finally,  this  paper 
takes  account  of  the  initial  position  outlined  by  the  Commission13  and  the  comments 
received14. 

2. 

SOME EXISTING INTERNET OF THINGS APPLICATIONS 

IoT should not be considered as a utopian concept; in fact, several early-bird components of 
IoT are already being deployed as illustrated hereafter:  

•  Consumers  are  increasingly  using  web-enabled  mobile  phones  equipped  with  cameras 
and/or  employing  Near-Field  Communication15.  These  phones  allow  users  to  access 
additional information regarding products such as allergen information. 

•  Member  States  are  increasingly  using  unique  serial  numbers  on  pharmaceutical  products 
(supported  by  bar-codes),  enabling  the  verification  of  each  product  before  it  reaches  the 
patient.  This  reduces  counterfeiting,  reimbursement  fraud  and  dispensing  errors16.  A 
similar approach taken on the traceability of consumer products in general would improve 
Europe's ability to tackle counterfeiting and to take measures against unsafe products17. 

•  Several  utility  companies  in  the  energy  sector  have  started  deploying  smart  electrical 
metering  systems  which  provide  consumption  information  to  consumers  in  real  time  and 
allow electricity providers to monitor electrical appliances remotely18. 

•  Within  traditional  industries,  such  as  logistics  (eFreight)19,  manufacturing20  and  retail, 
‘intelligent objects’ facilitate the exchange of information and increase the effectiveness of 
the production cycle. 

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See ec.europa.eu/information_society/eeurope/i2010/index_en.htm 
See COM/2007/0096 final — RFID in Europe: steps towards a policy framework 
See 2007/467/EC — Decision setting up the Expert Group on RFID 
See EESC Opinion n°1514 of 2008  
See www.internet2008.eu 
See Council Conclusion 16616/08 
See SEC/2008/2516 — Early Challenges regarding the “Internet of Things” 
See ec.europa.eu/information_society/policy/rfid/library/index_en.htm 
See www.nfc-forum.org/home 
See the work of EFPIA — www.efpia.eu/Content/Default.asp?PageID=566 
See RAPEX annual report ec.europa.eu/consumers/safety/rapex/docs/rapex_annualreport2009_en.pdf 
See www.esma-home.eu/default.asp 
See COM/2007/0607 final – Freight Transport Logistics Action Plan 
See The Fraunhofer Institute for Material Flow and Logistics : www.iml.fraunhofer.de/1327.html 

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These  examples  rely  on  several  building  blocks  such  as  RFID,  Near  Field  Communication 
(NFC),  2D  bar  codes,  wireless  sensor/actuators,  Internet  Protocol  Version  6  (IPv6)21,  ultra-
wide-band or 3/4G, which are all expected to play an important role in future deployments. 

The  European  Commission,  through  the  Framework  Programme  for  Research  and 
Development  (FP5-6-7)  and  the  Competitiveness  and  Innovation  Framework  Programme 
(CIP),  has  already  invested  in  these  technologies.  For  example,  in  the  transport  area,  it  is 
actively  promoting  their  deployment  through  the  Freight  Transport  Logistics  and  the 
Intelligent  Transport  System  Action  Plans22.  Europe’s  industry  is  as  well  a  strong  player  in 
many of these technologies, such as telecommunications equipment, enterprise software and 
semiconductors. Promoting the development of IoT thus reinforces the European ICT sector 
and  should  contribute  to  the  growth  of  other  sectors,  such  as  those  that  include  proximity 
services (tourism, personal healthcare, etc). 

3. 

THE GOVERNANCE OF THE INTERNET OF THINGS 

Why is there a role for public authorities? 

The  technical  advances  described  in  the  previous  section  will  occur  regardless  of  public 
intervention, simply following the normal cycle of innovation whereby industry harnesses for 
its own needs the new technologies developed by the scientific community. 

Although IoT will help to address certain problems, it will usher in its own set of challenges, 
some  directly  affecting  individuals.  For  example,  some  applications  may  be  closely 
interlinked  with  critical  infrastructures  such  as  the  power  supply  while  others  will  handle 
information related to an individual’s whereabouts. 

Simply  leaving  the  development  of  IoT  to  the  private  sector,  and  possibly  to  other  world 
regions23,24  is  not  a  sensible  option  in  view  of  the  deep  societal  changes  that  IoT  will  bring 
about.  Many  of  these  changes  will  have  to  be  addressed  by  European  policy-makers  and 
public  authorities  to  ensure  that  the  use  of  IoT  technologies  and  applications  will  stimulate 
economic  growth,  improve  individuals’  well-being  and  address  some  of  today’s  societal 
problems.  

Finally,  it  must  be  stressed  that  a  number  of  principles  that  should  also  underlie  the 
governance  of  the  IoT  have  already  been  debated  at  the  World  Summit  on  the  Information 
Society (WSIS)25. The EU was a key contributor to this international consensus, reflecting its 
earlier  positions26.  An  important  point  here  is  that  WSIS  recognised  the  responsibility  of 
governments  for  public  policy  issues27:  public  authorities  cannot  shirk  their  responsibilities 
towards their citizens. In particular, the governance of the IoT must be designed and exercised 
in a coherent manner with all public policy activities related to Internet Governance.  

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See the related work conducted at IETF: tools.ietf.org/wg/6lowpan/ 
See COM/2008/0886 final – Action plan for the deployment of ITS in Europe 
The  American  National  Intelligence  Council  considers  ubiquitous  computing  as  one  of  the  nine 
technologies that will be a ‘game-changer’ by 2025. See www.dni.gov/nic/NIC_2025_project.html 
Songdo (South Korea) is a 6km² city, now under construction, that will showcase the first large-scale 
deployment of IoT. See www.songdo.com/page1992.aspx 
The Tunis Agenda for the Information Society, one of the main outcome documents of WSIS, outlines 
the main principles www.itu.int/wsis/documents/doc_multi.asp?lang=fr&id=2266|2267 
See COM/2006/0181 final — Towards a Global Partnership in the Information Society: Follow-up to 
the Tunis Phase of the WSIS 
Tunis Agenda paragraph 35a states that ‘policy authority for Internet-related public policy issues is the 
sovereign right of States. They have rights and responsibilities for international Internet-related public 
policy issues’ 

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The governance of what? 

Typically,  things  become  connected  by  getting  assigned  an  identifier  and  a  means  to  be 
connected  to  other  objects  or  to  the  network.  The  amount  of  information  on  the  object  is 
usually  limited,  the  remainder  residing  elsewhere  in  the  network.  In  other  words:  accessing 
information  related  to  an  object  implies  establishing  a  network  communication.  Immediate 
questions arise as to: 

–  How is this identification structured? (the object naming) 

–  Who assigns the identifier? (the assigning authority) 

–  How  and  where  can  additional  information  about  that  thing  be  retrieved,  including  its 

history? (the addressing mechanism and the information repository) 

–  How is information security ensured? 

–  Which  stakeholders  are  accountable  for  each  of  the  above  questions,  what  is  the 

accountability mechanism? 

–  Which ethical and legal framework applies to the different stakeholders? 

IoT systems which have not properly addressed these questions could have serious negative 
implications, such as: 

–  Mishandled  information  could  reveal  an  individual’s  personal  data  or  compromise  the 

confidentiality of business data. 

–  Unsuitable assignation of rights and duties of private actors could stifle innovation. 

–  Lack of accountability could jeopardise the functioning of the IoT system itself. 

Line of action 1 — Governance 

The Commission will initiate and promote, in all relevant fora, discussions and decisions on: 

–  defining a set of principles underlying the governance of IoT; 

–  setting  up  an  ‘architecture’  with  a  sufficient  level  of  decentralised  management,  so  that 
public  authorities  throughout  the  world  can  exercise  their  responsibilities  as  regards 
transparency, competition and accountability. 

4. 

LIFTING THE OBSTACLES TO THE UPTAKE OF THE INTERNET OF THINGS 

Besides the governance issues addressed in section 3, as IoT becomes a reality there are many 
other issues still unresolved, each of them constituting a potential impediment to IoT uptake. 
This  section  will  highlight  the  main  ones  and  detail  the  actions  the  Commission  intends  to 
take to address them. 

Privacy and protection of personal data 

Social  acceptance  of  IoT  will  be  strongly  intertwined  with  respect  for  privacy  and  the 
protection of personal data, two fundamental rights of the EU28. On one hand, the protection 
of privacy and personal data will have an influence on how IoT is conceived. For example, a 
home  equipped  with  a  health  monitoring  system  could  process  some  of  the  inhabitants’ 

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See Articles 7 and 8 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union 

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sensitive data. A prerequisite for trust and acceptance of these systems is that appropriate data 
protection measures are put in place against possible misuse and other personal data related 
risks. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  likely  that  the  uptake  of  IoT  will  affect  the  way  we  understand 
privacy.  Evidence  for  this  is  given  by  recent  ICT  evolutions,  such  as  mobile  phones  and 
online social networks, particularly among younger generations. 

Line of action 2 — Continuous monitoring of the privacy and the protection of personal 
data questions 
The Commission recently adopted a Recommendation29 that provides guidelines on how to 
operate RFID applications in compliance with privacy and data protection principles; in 2010 
it  intends  to  publish  a  broader  Communication  on  privacy  and  trust  in  the  ubiquitous 
information society. 

These  two  examples  illustrate  how,  in  practice,  the  Commission  will  watch  over  the 
application of data protection legislation to IoT: 

–  by consulting, when necessary, the Article 29 Data Protection Working Party; 

–  by providing guidance on the correct interpretation of EU legislation; 

–  by fostering dialogue among stakeholders; 

–  by proposing, if necessary, additional regulatory instruments. 

Line of action 3 — The ‘silence of the chips’ 

The  Commission  will  launch  a  debate  on  the  technical  and  legal  aspects  of  the  ‘right  to 
silence of the chips’, which has been referred to under different names by different authors30 
and  expresses  the  idea  that  individuals  should  be  able  to  disconnect  from  their  networked 
environment at any time.  

Trust, Acceptance and Security 

Information security is a must and is seen by most stakeholders as a major concern of IoT. 

In  the  private  sphere,  information  security  is  closely  linked  to  the  questions  of  trust  and 
privacy mentioned above. Past experience with the development of ICT shows that they are 
sometimes neglected during the design phase, and that integrating features to safeguard them 
at  a  later  stage  creates  difficulties,  is  costly  and  can  considerably  reduce  the  quality  of  the 
systems. It is therefore crucial that IoT components are designed from their inception with a 
privacy- and security-by-design mindset and comprehensively include user requirements. 

As  part  of  its  2009  Work  Programme,  in  support  of  EU  policy,  the  European  Network  and 
Information  Security  Agency  (ENISA)  has  undertaken  to  identify  emerging  risks  affecting 
trust  and  confidence,  in  particular  regarding  RFID.  This  constitutes  a  first  step  in  the 
understanding of the privacy and security risks that will impinge on IoT. 

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See C(2009)3200 — Recommendation on the implementation of privacy and data protection principles 
in applications supported by radio-frequency identification 
See Adam Greenfield, ‘Everyware’, ISBN 0321384016 

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Another key aspect to building trust is the capability to adjust the functioning and properties 
of  technological  systems  to  individual  preferences  (within  safe  boundaries).  Studies31  have 
shown that giving users a sufficient level of control improves their level of trust and plays an 
important role in the uptake of the technology.  

In  the  business  sphere,  information  security  translates  into  the  availability,  reliability  and 
confidentiality of business data. For a company, questions arise as to who has access to their 
data or how they can grant partial access to their data to a third party. These questions, while 
in  appearance  simple,  are  profoundly  affected  by  the  complexity  of  today’s  business 
processes32. 

Line of action 4 — Identification of emerging risks 

The Commission will follow the ENISA work mentioned above and will take further action 
as  appropriate,  including  regulatory  and  non-regulatory  measures,  to  provide  a  policy 
framework that enables IoT to meet the challenges related to trust, acceptance and security. 

Line of action 5 — IoT as a vital resource to economy and society 

Should  IoT  grow  to  the  importance  it  is  expected  to  attain,  any  disruption  might  have  a 
significant  impact  on  economy  and  society.  The  Commission  will  therefore  closely  follow 
the  development  of  IoT  infrastructures  into  a  vital  resource  for  Europe,  especially  in 
connection with its activities on the protection of critical information infrastructure33. 

Standardisation 

Standardisation will play an important role in the uptake of IoT, by lowering entry barriers to 
newcomers  and  operational  costs  for  users,  by  being  a  prerequisite  for  interoperability  and 
economies  of  scale  and  by  allowing  industry  to  better  compete  at  international  level.  IoT 
Standardisation should aim  at  rationalising some existing standards or developing new ones 
where needed.  

IoT  would  also  greatly  benefit  from  a  rapid  deployment  of  IPv6,  as  proposed  by  the 
Commission34 and endorsed by the Council, as this would make it possible to directly address 
any number of objects needed through the Internet.  

Line of action 6 — Standards Mandate 

The  Commission  will  assess  the  extent  to  which  existing  standards  mandates  can  include 
further issues related to IoT35 or launch  additional  mandates if necessary. Additionally, the 
Commission  will  keep  monitoring  developments  in  European  Standards  Organisations 
(ETSI,  CEN,  CENELEC),  their  international  counterparts  (ISO,  ITU)  and  other  standards 
bodies and consortia (IETF, EPCglobal, etc) with a view for IoT standards to be developed in 
an  open,  transparent  and  consensual  manner  with  the  participation  of  all  interested  parties. 

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See the European research project SWAMI: www.isi.fraunhofer.de/t/projekte/e-fri-swami.htm 
See the related work of IETF — https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/esds 
See  COM/2009/0149  final  —  Protecting  Europe  from  large  scale  cyber-attacks  and  disruptions: 
enhancing preparedness, security and resilience 
See COM/2008/0313 final — Advancing the Internet: action plan for the deployment of IPv6 in Europe 
See mandate EC/436 on RFID and mandate EC/441 on smart meters 

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Particular  attention  will  be  given  to  the  machine-to-machine  workgroup  of  the  European 
Telecommunications  Standards  Institute  (ETSI)  and  the  Internet  Engineering  Task  Force 
(IETF) in the area of discovery services. 

Research and Development 
The  Commission  recently  highlighted36  its  ambitions  with  regard  to  ICT  research  and 
proposed  a  number  of  measures  to  strengthen  it  in  Europe.  IoT  is  a  promising  candidate  to 
contribute to this initiative, as it addresses wide societal problems and is an area where the EU 
and  Member  States  have  already  achieved  auspicious  results,  though  significant  research  is 
still needed37 to make IoT a reality. 

Line of action 7 — Research and Development 

The Commission will continue to finance FP7 research projects in the area of IoT, putting an 
emphasis  on  important  technological  aspects  such  as  microelectronics,  non-silicon  based 
components, energy harvesting technologies, ubiquitous positioning, networks of wirelessly 
communicating  smart  systems,  semantics,  privacy-  and  security-by-design,  software 
emulating human reasoning and on novel applications. 

Line of action 8 — Public-Private Partnership 

The  Commission  is  currently  preparing  the  setting-up  of  four  public-private  partnerships 
(PPP)  where  IoT  can  play  an  important  role.  Three  of  them,  ‘green  cars’,  ‘energy-efficient 
buildings’  and  ‘Factories  of  the  Future’  were  proposed  by  the  Commission  as  part  of  the 
recovery package38. The fourth one, ‘Future Internet’, aims at further integrating the existing 
ICT research efforts in relation to the future of the Internet39. 

Openness to innovation 

IoT systems will be designed, managed and used by multiple stakeholders driven by different 
business  models  and  various  interests.  To  be  a  catalyst  for  growth  and  innovation,  these 
systems should: 

–  allow  new  applications  to  be  built  on  top  of  existing  systems  and  new  systems  to  be 
deployed  in  parallel with existing systems  without  creating  excessive burdens for market 
entry  or  other  operational  barriers,  such  as  excessive  licenses/fees  or  inappropriate 
intellectual property schemes40; 

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38 
39 
40 

the 

joint 

EU-EPoSS 

See COM/2009/0116 final — A Strategy for ICT R&D and Innovation in Europe: Raising the Game 
See 
www.iot-visitthefuture.eu/fileadmin/documents/researchforeurope/270808_IoT_in_2020_Workshop_R
eport_V1-1.pdf  
See COM/2008/0800 final — A European Economic Recovery Plan 
See www.future-Internet.eu 
As an illustration, the efforts by essential RFID patent-holders to offer a one-stop shop for patent-users 
reveal the complexity and length of such a process. See www.rfidlicensing.com/ or the ‘RFID Journal’ 
of 
to  Launch  First  Licenses’  — 
www.rfidjournal.com/article/view/4785  

‘RFID  Consortium  Readies 

13  April 

workshop 

report: 

2009, 

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–  allow an adequate level of interoperability so that innovative and competitive cross-domain 

systems and applications can be developed. 

Many of the technologies mentioned in section 2 are already mature. However, in some cases, 
real-case user-driven scenarios do not yet exist, leading to a situation where the uptake of the 
technology  itself  is  slowed  down.  This  is  reinforced  by  the  fact  that  the  business  models 
supporting  IoT  are  not  yet  established  and  industry  is  sometimes  hesitant  to  invest.  Europe 
can  be  a  catalyst  in  such  situation  by  encouraging  and,  where  appropriate,  funding  projects 
aimed at validating these applications. 

Line of action 9 — Innovation and pilot projects 

Complementing the research activities listed above, the Commission will consider promoting 
the  deployment  of  IoT  applications  by  launching  pilot  projects  through  CIP41.  These  pilots 
should  focus  on  IoT  applications  that  deliver  strong  benefits  to  society,  such  as  e-health,  e-
accessibility, climate change, or helping to bridge the digital divide. 

Institutional awareness 

The  preparatory  work  for  the  Communication  has  revealed  that  only  a  limited  number  of 
industrial  and  institutional  stakeholders  have  a  comprehensive  understanding  of  the 
challenges and opportunities posed by IoT. 

Line of action 10 — Institutional Awareness 

The Commission will regularly inform the European Parliament, the Council, the European 
Economic  and  Social  Committee,  the  Committee  of  the  Regions,  the  Article  29  Data 
Protection Working Party42 and any other relevant stakeholders about IoT developments. 

International dialogue 

Many  IoT  systems  and  applications  will  be  borderless  by  nature  and  therefore  require  a 
sustained international dialogue, notably on matters of architecture, standards and governance. 

Line of action 11: International dialogue 
The Commission intends to intensify the existing43,44 dialogue on all aspects of IoT with its 
international  partners,  aiming  to  agree  on  relevant  joint  actions,  share  best  practices  and 
promote the lines of action laid down in this Communication. 

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43 

44 

See ec.europa.eu/cip/index_en.htm 
See ec.europa.eu/justice_home/fsj/privacy/workinggroup/index_en.htm 
As  part  of  the  2007  Framework  for  Advancing  Transatlantic  Economic  Integration  between  the 
European Union and the United States, cooperation on RFID has been singled out and EU and US are 
now  exchanging  best  practices  to  optimise  the  economic  and  social  impacts  of  RFID.  See 
ec.europa.eu/enterprise/policies/international/cooperating-governments/usa/transatlantic-economic-
council/index_en.htm 
In summer 2009, the Directorate-General Information Society and Media of the Commission will sign a 
memorandum  of  cooperation  with  the  Japanese  Ministry  of  Economy,  Trade  and  Industry  on,  among 
others, RFID, wireless sensor networks and the Internet of things 

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Waste management 

In  many  cases,  the  connection  between  objects  will  be  made  through  a  sensor  or  a  tag 
embedded  in  the  object.  For  the  foreseeable  future,  tags45  will  be  made  of  metal  (typically 
silicone, copper, silver and aluminium) whose presence can create difficulties on the recycling 
lines of glass, plastic, aluminium and tinplate. 

On the other hand, being able to precisely identify objects during the recycling process is an 
advantage and tagged objects could therefore be recycled more efficiently by being retrieved 
from normal bulk waste disposal. 

Line of action 12 — RFID in recycling lines 

As  part  of  its  regular  monitoring  of  the  waste  management  industry,  the  Commission  will 
launch a study to assess the difficulties of recycling tags and the benefits and nuisances that 
the presence of tags can have on the recycling of objects. 

Future developments 

As  mentioned  earlier,  IoT  is  not  a  monolith  but  an  umbrella  that  covers  a  diverse  range  of 
technologies, systems and applications being developed on a constant basis. 

While engaging in constant monitoring of the evolution of IoT, the Commission will pursue 
its activities on: 

–  the  timely  availability  of  appropriate  spectrum  resources.  The  increased  number  of 
connected devices will require a new level of infrastructure deployment, both in terms of 
wired  and  wireless  connectivity.  For  wireless  communications,  ensuring  the  timely 
availability  of  spectrum  resources  is  important46,  and  the  Commission  will  continue  to 
monitor and assess the need for additional harmonised spectrum for specific IoT purposes; 

–  electromagnetic fields (EMF). Most of today’s foreseeable IoT devices are expected to be 
in the ‘radiofrequency’ group (i.e. >100 kHz) and operate with very low power, unlikely to 
produce  significant  levels  of  exposure  to  EMF.  The  existing  regulatory  framework  on 
EMF47  is  under  periodic  review  and  will  keep ensuring  that  all  devices  and  systems  will 
respect the safety and health needs of the population in the future. 

Line of action 13 — Measuring the uptake 

Eurostat will start publishing in December 2009 statistics on the use of RFID technologies.  

Monitoring  the  introduction  of  IoT  related  technologies  will  provide  information  on  their 
degree  of  penetration  and  allow  the  assessment  of  their  impact  on  the  economy  and  the 
society as well as the effectiveness of the related Community policies. 

45 

46 

47 

Long-term  research  is  being  conducted  into  making  these  tags  out  of  organic  and  biodegradable 
material 
Specifically,  the  intention  is  to  regularly  update  the  short-range  devices  (SRD)  decision  (See 
2006/771/EC) 
See  Council  Recommendation  1999/519/EC  and  Directives  1999/5/EC,  2004/40/EC  and  2006/95/EC. 
See  as  well  the  opinion  of  19  January  2009  from  the  Scientific  Committee  on  Emerging  and  Newly 
Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR) 

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Line of action 14 — Assessment of evolution 

Beyond  the  specific  aspects  mentioned  above,  it  is  important  that  a  multi-stakeholder 
mechanism is put in place at European level to: 

–  monitor the evolution of IoT; 

–  support the Commission in carrying out the various actions listed in this Communication;  

–  assess which additional measures should be undertaken by European Public Authorities. 

The  Commission  will  use  FP7  to  conduct  this  work,  by  gathering  a  representative  set  of 
European  stakeholders  and  ensuring  a  regular  dialogue  and  sharing  of  best  practices  with 
other world regions. 

5. 

CONCLUSIONS 

As  this  document  has  described,  IoT  is  not  yet  a  tangible  reality,  but  rather  a  prospective 
vision of a number of technologies that, combined together, could in the coming 5 to 15 years 
drastically modify the way our societies function. 

By adopting a proactive approach, Europe could play a leading role in shaping how IoT works 
and reap the associated benefits in terms of economic growth and individual well-being, thus 
making the  Internet  of things an Internet of things for people. Failing to do  so would mean 
missing an important opportunity and could place Europe into a position where it is forced to 
adopt  technologies  that  have  not  been  designed  with  its  core  values  in  mind,  such  as  the 
protection of privacy and personal data. 

By  launching  a  number  of  actions  and  reflections,  the  Commission  intends  to  be  a  driving 
force behind this effort and it invites the European Parliament, the Council and all concerned 
stakeholders to work jointly to achieve these ambitious yet achievable objectives. 

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