Last year saw the Mirai botnet harness routers and other IoT devices to launch DDoS attacks against internet services.

Is this type of attack something we’re going to see more of in 2017, and what can companies and individuals do to protect themselves? We spoke to Sam Rehman, chief technology officer at attack prevention specialist Arxan Technologies to find out more about security and the Internet of Things.

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D-Link is facing a lawsuit brought against it by the US Federal Trade Commission for the poor security of its routers and connected cameras. The FTC says the company failed to take reasonable steps to protect users from hackers.

The FTC is seeking to improve the security of all IoT (internet of things) devices in the wake of compromised devices being used to launch high-profile DDoS attacks such as Marai and Leet Botnet. D-Link argues that the charges brought against it are "unwarranted and baseless" and plans to "vigorously defend itself".

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The Mirai botnet is thought to have affected more than 1.5 million smart devices over the past few months.

Router manufacturer Securefi is aiming to combat this problem with the launch of a new IoT device security service. Initially available for the company's Almond 3 routers, Securifi's solution protects connected home devices like DVRs, IP cameras, and smart thermostats from a number of key online threats.

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It looks like 2017 will be a great year for Internet of things industry. 451 Research's new report says that almost three quarters of all businesses worldwide, 71 percent of them to be exact, are gathering IoT data today.

The report is based on a survey of 1,000 organizations, scattered all over the globe. The best part about this figure is that it represents a three percent jump compared to its last report, which was released a quarter ago.

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In the past year we’ve already seen the Internet of Things used to carry out cyber attacks, and many experts are predicting that this is a problem that will grow in coming months.

Given that many people may have acquired new IoT devices over the holiday period, financial advice website RefiGuide has put together a timely infographic looking at the risks IoT devices can pose and what you can do to protect yourself.

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Continuing our series of expert predictions for the coming year, today we turn our attention to the Internet of Things which has begun to take off in a serious way in 2016.

Although the IoT may already be pretty big it's set to get much, much bigger. Figures earlier this year from Machina Research predict the number of IoT connections will grow from 6 billion in 2015 to 27 billion in 2025. So what opportunities and challenges is this going to present to businesses?

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In the sci-fi film Ex Machina, reclusive inventor Nathan Bateman foresees a bleak future, telling the movie's protagonist, Caleb, that "One day the AIs are going to look back on us the same way we look at fossil skeletons on the plains of Africa".

When we don’t understand something, we tend to fear it; which is one reason popular movies like Ex Machina and HBO’s nail-biting new series Westworld like to imagine futures in which artificial intelligence plots to destroy humanity.

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The global business landscape is being transformed by the Internet of Things. Soon, every business will be an IoT business simply because those that don’t adapt, innovate, and transform their models will risk falling behind in the Connected Economy. But even as business leaders scramble headlong to get in on the IoT gold rush, many are faced with the same harsh realization: that actually monetizing IoT data is difficult.

I’ve written about the challenges of IoT monetization before, and I agree with Gartner’s assessment that 80 percent of IoT implementations will squander their transformational opportunities. This statistic isn’t due to a lack of opportunity, as I believe that for any company that has customers, suppliers, employees or assets, IoT monetization can be transformational. Here are my top three strategies for ensuring that your IoT initiative is part of the 20 percent that actually succeed.

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Every fifth business is planning on adopting the Internet of things (IoT) to help address customer demand, and improve engagement. This is according to a new report by analytics firm SAS.

These companies are mostly focused on improving front-end processes and efficiency. Only after tackling these issues will they focus on internal processes.

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Cybersecurity, the Internet of things, driverless cars, artificial intelligence. These topics were hot in 2016, and interest in them should continue strong in 2017. However, the discussions will take new turns. Where will they go?

I predict that three particular trends will gain real momentum and re-shape the cyber landscape in 2017.

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The Internet of Things, or IoT, seems to be the big headline in tech news lately.

Perhaps you’ve heard of smart remotes, outlets, thermostats or alarm systems, but with all the recent development in this area, there are probably quite a few devices that you haven’t yet considered. Here are six worth adding to your tech radar.

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Amazon's Echo devices are incredible. I'll admit that I was a skeptic at first, but once I got my own, I was hooked. Not only can the Alexa voice assistant provide me with important data like weather, news, and traffic, but it can play music too. Most importantly, it serves as a brilliant IoT control unit. My house has several WiFi connected power outlets, and I can verbally tell Alexa to turn off my lamps. It can even control my television!

Much of Amazon's success with Echo and Alexa is thanks to third-party developers and hardware. Today, Conexant and Amazon announce the AudioSmart 2-mic Development Kit. This add-on for the Raspberry Pi should enable easier development of devices using Amazon's Alexa voice technology. This could ultimately lead to further growth and adoption of the Alexa voice assistant.

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If there’s one thing you can say with certainty about cyber-security in 2017, it’s that many companies are going to fail because they are simply not doing the right thing. Fundamental flaws still exist.

Until the technical people lift their heads up and see that security and business are different sides of the same coin, we will inevitably see more damaging attacks. When security people learn to speak in the language of business they will begin to understand just where in the organization they need to apply their expertise.

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Vivaldi Technologies -- led by Opera co-founder Jon S von Tetzchner -- has released Vivaldi 1.5, the latest version of its customizable web browser for Windows, Mac and Linux.

The big talking point in version 1.5 is Vivaldi’s integration into the Philips Hue IoT ecosystem, but the new release also adds a number of more universal features, such as support for tab drag and drop, which makes tab stacking much simpler than before.

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This is my promised column on data security and the Internet of Things (IoT). The recent Dyn DDoS attack showed the IoT is going to be a huge problem as networked devices like webcams are turned into zombie hoards. Fortunately I think I may have a solution to the problem. Really.

I’m an idiot today, but back in the early 1990’s I ran a startup that built one of the Internet’s earliest Content Distribution Networks (CDN), only we didn’t call it that because the term had not yet been invented. Unlike the CDNs of today, ours wasn’t about video, it was about the daily electronic delivery of PDF editions of newspapers and magazines. Canon told us that if the New York Times, say, would make a PDF version of its daily paper, the Japanese company would give an ink jet printer to every electronic subscriber, making their money solely on replacement ink cartridge sales. Communication would be between the CDN and printer with no PC involved. It was effectively an Internet of Things, circa 1994. Obviously, we failed, but learned a lot along the way.

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