The Rise of Drones in Internet of Things: A Survey on the Evolution, Prospects and Challenges of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

Nader S Labib,Pascal Bouvry,Matthias R Brust,Gregoire Danoy

doi:10.1109/access.2021.3104963

Nader S Labib, Pascal Bouvry + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1109/access.2021.3104963

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Abstract

The recent years have seen a rise in the incorporation and integration of new smart connected devices and platforms such as Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to the ubiquitous network of Internet of Things (IoT). UAVs not only offer new means of delivering value-added IoT services through a wide range of applications ranging from monitoring and surveillance to on-demand last-mile delivery and people transport, but they also promise a pragmatic solution to the limitations of fixed terrestrial IoT infrastructure. Owning to their potential, UAVs are expected to soon be an integral part of our cities, dominating the shared low-altitude airspace. This introduces new research challenges in privacy, security and most notably in the safe management of UAVs’ operation under high traffic demands. To this end, this work presents a holistic study on the current state-of-the-art of UAVs and low-altitude airspace traffic management. This work additionally explores the technical standardisation landscape and highlights synergies between scientific research and standardisation efforts towards enabling safe UAV operations, while taking into consideration additional IoT inherent challenges such as security, data protection and privacy.

Highlights

T HE Internet of Things (IoT) may be described as a network of uniquely addressable and interconnected devices, built on standard communication protocols whose point of convergence is the internet [1]
Spatial Data Models While the majority of allowed Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) flights are within the Visual Line of Sight (VLOS), the greater commercial benefit comes from applications that would inevitably require authorisation Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLoS)
DIRECTIONS The recent years have seen a rise in market demand for commercial UAVs as smart IoT–connected devices and platforms

Summary

Introduction

T HE Internet of Things (IoT) may be described as a network of uniquely addressable and interconnected devices, built on standard communication protocols whose point of convergence is the internet [1]. IoT, as explained in [2], [3], can be seen as part of the generation internet, IoT has its unique vision that expands beyond the confinements of internet to enabling an inter-connected world of ”things” both, physical and virtual. To this end, the technologies of IoT catalysed the growth of data–driven applications as well as encouraged the integration of new connected devices, in turn, creating new valueadded services in almost every market sector and unleashing a magnitude of new opportunities for businesses, individuals and society [4]. These devices connect directly or indirectly to the internet using wireless and wired technologies

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