Atmel has announced that it will be implementing Intel's Enhanced Privacy ID (EPID) technology on all of its SmartConnect wireless solutions. The move will provide mutual authentication between the IoT node and the cloud.

Intel EPID is an ISO standard digital signature encryption method, first implemented on Intel platforms in 2011. The technology delivers hardware root of trust functions and is Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) compatible. EPID provides a mechanism to allow devices to be uniquely identified and for secure communication to take place between them. In addition to this the group membership can be determined without revealing the identity of the specific platform, giving the system an additional level of security. Intel EPID can dynamically assign and revoke group memberships by individuals. The technology also meets the latest protected key delivery requirements for content and data protection protocols.

According to Kaivan Karimi, Atmel's general manager of wireless solutions, "Implementing Intel EPID offers IoT designers a seamless edge to cloud IoT platform with proven security options available with our broad IoT portfolio,"

With tens of billions of devices anticipated by 2020, security is going to be one of the crucial components to enable a seamless connection between the edge node and the cloud.

Source: Atmel press release.