The Digital Standard

The Internet of Things (IoT) is rapidly expanding, with more and more consumer products and software connecting to the internet for added functionality—but this connection, if not properly configured, can increase privacy and security risks for consumers. To help researchers to evaluate how thoroughly any given internet-connected hardware or software product ensures information security and data privacy—and to enable designers, developers, and manufacturers to create products with specific benchmarks in mind—Ranking Digital Rights and Consumer Reports, in collaboration with other organizations, developed the Digital Standard framework. While instructions were initially open-ended, OTI developed a detailed process for conducting independent product testing in our Digital Standard Testing Handbook. We then used this handbook to test three example products and published our notes as a series of case studies, demonstrating how the handbook can be used to measure any IoT product against the Digital Standard.