construction. agriculture there are numerous iot applications in farming such as collecting data on temperature, rainfall, humidity, wind speed, pest infestation, and soil content. this data can be used to automate farming techniques, take informed decisions to improve quality and quantity, minimize risk and waste, and reduce the effort required to manage crops. for example, farmers can now monitor soil temperature and moisture from afar and even apply iot-acquired data to precision fertilization programs. the overall goal is that data from sensors, coupled with the farmer's knowledge and intuition about his or her farm, can help increase farm productivity, and also help reduce costs. in august 2018, toyota tsusho began a partnership with microsoft to create fish farming tools using the microsoft azure application suite for iot technologies related to water management. developed in part by researchers from kindai university, the water pump mechanisms use artificial intelligence to count the number of fish on a conveyor belt, analyze the number of fish, and deduce the effectiveness of water flow from the data the fish provide. the farmbeats project from microsoft research that uses tv white space to connect farms is also a part of the azure marketplace now. maritime iot devices are in use to monitor the environments and systems of boats and yachts. many pleasure boats are left unattended for days in summer, and months in winter so such devices provide valuable early alerts of boat flooding, fire, and deep discharge of batteries. the use of global internet data networks such as sigfox, combined with long-life batteries, and microelectronics allows the engine rooms, bilge, and batteries to be constantly monitored and reported to connected android & apple applications for example. infrastructure monitoring and controlling operations of sustainable urban and rural infrastructures like bridges, railway tracks and on- and offshore wind farms is a key application of the iot. the iot infrastructure can be used for monitoring any events or changes in structural conditions that can compromise safety and increase risk. the iot can benefit the construction industry by cost-saving, time reduction, better quality workday, paperless workflow and increase in productivity. it can help in taking faster decisions and saving money in real-time data analytics. it can also be used for scheduling repair and maintenance activities efficiently, by coordinating tasks between different service providers and users of these facilities. iot devices can also be used to control critical infrastructure like bridges to provide access to ships. the usage of iot devices for monitoring and operating infrastructure is likely to improve incident management and emergency response coordination, and quality of service, up-times and reduce costs of operation in all infrastructure-related areas. even areas such as waste management can benefit from automation and optimization that could be brought in by the iot. metropolitan scale deployments there are several planned or ongoing large-scale deployments of the iot, to enable better management of cities and systems. for example, songdo, south korea, the first of its kind fully equipped and wired smart city, is gradually being built, with approximately 70 percent of the business district completed as of june 2018. much of the city is planned to be wired and automated, with little or no human intervention. another application is currently undergoing a project in santander, spain. for this deployment, two approaches have been adopted. this city of 180,000 inhabitants has already seen 18,000 downloads of its city smartphone app. the app is connected to 10,000 sensors that enable services like parking search, environmental monitoring, digital city agenda, and more. city context information is used in this deployment so as to benefit merchants through a spark deals mechanism based on city behavior that aims at maximizing the impact of each notification. other examples of large-scale deployments underway include the sino-singapore guangzhou knowledge city; work on improving air and water quality, reducing noise pollution, and increasing transportation efficiency in san jose, california; and smart traffic management in western singapore. using its rpma (random phase multiple access) technology, san diego-based ingenu has built a nationwide public network for low-bandwidth data transmissions using the same unlicensed 2.4 gigahertz spectrum as wi-fi. ingenu's "machine network" covers more than a third of the us population across 35 major cities including san diego and dallas. french company, sigfox, commenced building an ultra narrowband wireless data network in the san francisco bay area in 2014, the first business to achieve such a deployment in the u.s. it subsequently announced it would set up a total of 4000 base stations to cover a total of 30 cities in the u.s. by the end of 2016, making it the largest iot network coverage provider in the country thus far. cisco also participates in smart cities projects. cisco has started deploying technologies for smart wi-fi, smart safety & security, smart lighting, smart parking, smart transports, smart bus stops, smart kiosks, remote expert for government services (regs) and smart education in the five km area in the city of vijaywada, india. another example of a large deployment is the one completed by new york waterways in new york city to connect all the city's vessels and be able to monitor them live 24/7. the network was designed and engineered by fluidmesh networks, a chicago-based company developing wireless networks for critical applications. the nyww network is currently providing coverage on the hudson river, east river, and upper new york bay. with the wireless network in place, ny waterway is able to take control of its fleet and passengers in a way that was not previously possible. new applications can include security, energy and fleet management, digital signage, public wi-fi, paperless ticketing and others. energy management significant numbers of energy-consuming devices (e.g. lamps, household appliances, motors, pumps, etc.) already integrate internet connectivity, which can allow them to communicate with utilities not only to balance power generation but also helps optimize the energy consumption as a whole. these devices allow for remote control by users, or central management via a cloud-based interface, and enable functions like scheduling (e.g., remotely powering on or off heating systems, controlling ovens, changing lighting conditions etc.). the smart grid is a utility-side iot application; systems gather and act on energy and power-related information to improve the efficiency of the production and distribution of electricity. using advanced metering infrastructure (ami) internet-connected devices, electric utilities not only collect data from end-users, but also manage distribution automation devices like transformers. environmental monitoring environmental monitoring applications of the iot typically use sensors to assist in environmental protection by monitoring air or water quality, atmospheric or soil conditions, and can even include areas like monitoring the movements of wildlife and their habitats. development of resource-constrained devices connected to the internet also means that other applications like earthquake or tsunami early-warning systems can also be used by emergency services to provide more effective aid. iot devices in this application typically span a large geographic area and can also be mobile. it has been argued that the standardization that iot brings to wireless sensing will revolutionize this area. living lab another example of integrating the iot is living lab which integrates and combines research and innovation processes, establishing within a public-private-people-partnership. there are currently 320 living labs that use the iot to collaborate and share knowledge between stakeholders to co-create innovative and technological products. for companies to implement and develop iot services for smart cities, they need to have incentives. the governments play key roles in smart city projects as changes in policies will help cities to implement the iot which provides effectiveness, efficiency, and accuracy of the resources that are being used. for instance, the government provides tax incentives and cheap rent, improves public transports, and offers an environment where start-up companies, creative industries, and multinationals may co-create, share a common infrastructure and labor markets, and take advantage of locally embedded technologies, production process, and transaction costs. the relationship between the technology developers and governments who manage the city's assets, is key to provide open access to resources to users in an efficient way. military the internet of military things (iomt) is the application of iot technologies in the military domain for the purposes of reconnaissance, surveillance, and other combat-related objectives. it is heavily influenced by the future prospects of warfare in an urban environment and involves the use of sensors, munitions, vehicles, robots, human-wearable biometrics, and other smart technology that is relevant on the battlefield. one of the examples of iot devices used in the military is xaver 1000 system. the xaver 1000 was developed by israel's camero tech, which is the latest in the company's line of "through wall imaging systems". the xaver line uses millimeter wave (mmw) radar, or radar in the range of 30-300 gigahertz. it is equipped with an ai-based life target tracking system as well as its own 3d 'sense-through-the-wall' technology. internet of battlefield things the internet of battlefield things (iobt) is a project initiated and executed by the u.s. army research laboratory (arl) that focuses on the basic science related to the iot that enhance the capabilities of army soldiers. in 2017, arl launched the internet of battlefield things collaborative research alliance (iobt-cra), establishing a working collaboration between industry, university, and army researchers to advance the theoretical foundations of iot technologies and their applications to army operations. ocean of things the ocean of things project is a darpa-led program designed to establish an internet of things across large ocean areas for the purposes of collecting, monitoring, and analyzing environmental and vessel activity data. the project entails the deployment of about 50,000 floats that house a passive sensor suite that autonomously detect and track military and commercial vessels as part of a cloud-based network. product digitalization there are several applications of smart or active packaging in which a qr code or nfc tag is affixed on a product or its packaging. the tag itself is passive, however, it contains a unique identifier (typically a url) which enables a user to access digital content about the product via a smartphone. strictly speaking, such passive items are not part of the internet of things, but they can be seen as enablers of digital interactions. the term "internet of packaging" has been coined to describe applications in which unique identifiers are used, to automate supply chains, and are scanned on large scale by consumers to access digital content. authentication of the unique identifiers, and thereby of the product itself, is possible via a copy-sensitive digital watermark or copy detection pattern for scanning when scanning a qr code, while nfc tags can encrypt communication. trends and characteristics the iot's major significant trend in recent years is the explosive growth of devices connected and controlled via the internet. the wide range of applications for iot technology mean that the specifics can be very different from one device to the next but there are basic characteristics shared by most. the iot creates opportunities for more direct integration of the physical world into computer-based systems, resulting in efficiency improvements, economic benefits, and reduced human exertions. the number of iot devices increased 31% year-over-year to 8.4 billion in the year 2017 and it is estimated that there will be 30 billion devices by 2020. intelligence ambient intelligence and autonomous control are not part of the original concept of the internet of things. ambient intelligence and autonomous control do not necessarily require internet structures, either. however, there is a shift in research (by companies such as intel) to integrate the concepts of the iot and autonomous control, with initial outcomes towards this direction considering objects as the driving force for autonomous iot. an approach in this context is deep reinforcement learning where most of iot systems provide a dynamic and interactive environment. training an agent (i.e., iot device) to behave smartly in such an environment cannot be addressed by conventional machine learning algorithms such as supervised learning. by reinforcement learning approach, a learning agent can sense the environment's state (e.g., sensing home temperature), perform actions (e.g., turn hvac on or off) and learn through the maximizing accumulated rewards it receives in long term. iot intelligence can be offered at three levels: iot devices, edge/fog nodes, and cloud computing. the need for intelligent control and decision at each level depends on the time sensitiveness of the iot application. for example, an autonomous