The Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) recently announced a new framework for integrating FIDO Device Onboard (FDO) and WBA OpenRoaming technologies. This initiative enables a ‘zero-touch’ seamless and secure onboarding process for Internet of Things (IoT) Wi-Fi devices, parallel to the simplicity and security of Wi-Fi device onboarding using OpenRoaming.
The “OpenRoaming for IoT – FIDO Device Onboarding Framework” report details how these technologies work together to simplify and secure the onboarding process for IoT devices, transforming large scale IoT deployments.
The integration between OpenRoaming and FDO represents a significant milestone in the realm of Wi-Fi device onboarding and addresses critical challenges of large-scale IoT deployments by providing a secure, scalable, and automated solution.
By automating the onboarding process, this allows headless and other pre-configured FDO IoT devices to be onboarded straight out of the box using OpenRoaming, it can then receive new OpenRoaming credentials, allowing it to connect via OpenRoaming permanently, or receive credentials to connect to a private Wi-Fi network for a permanent connection.
Wi-Fi-based IoT devices have historically faced challenges due to the complexity of manual onboarding processes, which has made large-scale deployment inefficient. By leveraging the OpenRoaming global network made up of millions of hotspots, the onboarding process becomes seamless, accelerating the adoption of Wi-Fi-based IoT devices across sectors like smart cities, manufacturing, and logistics.
Key benefits:
- Zero-touch, secure onboarding: Automates device onboarding, enhancing operational efficiency and ensuring secure authentication
- OpenRoaming and FDO integration: Describes how pre-configured OpenRoaming and FDO credentials enable seamless device connectivity across networks
- Alternative network environments: Covers complex deployments and provisioning challenges
- Supply chain security: Ensures device security through ownership vouchers and cryptographic mechanisms
“This new framework will turbocharge secure and efficient IoT device deployments, overcoming the challenges of onboarding IoT devices into a Wi-Fi network,” said Tiago Rodrigues, CEO of the WBA. “This framework standardises OpenRoaming for FDO, encouraging a widespread adoption and cross-industry collaboration, and will enable a wide range of industries to benefit from improved operational efficiency and security across their IoT devices into Wi-Fi networks.”
“WBA’s work on zero-touch onboarding with OpenRoaming and managing the ownership of industrial IoT devices with FIDO will address a critical industry challenge and facilitate large-scale deployments of these devices. Intel is proud to lead this initiative at WBA,” added Dr. Necati Canpolat, Senior Staff Wireless Architect at Intel and WBA Board Director.
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