Under the agreement, NEC will adopt Arm’s Platform Security Architecture
Japanese tech giant NEC has announced a strategic collaboration with Arm to develop secure internet of things solutions for smart cities using artificial intelligence.
NEC said that ensuring the security of IoT connected devices is a top priority that poses a major challenge for many companies.
Under the agreement, NEC will adopt the Arm Platform Security Architecture, an industry standard framework for building securely connected devices. PSA includes the concepts of threat modeling, architectural guidelines and implementation resources that reduce the cost and risk associated with IoT security.
“The pace of deployment of IoT devices is growing rapidly, and smart cities will be an important use case for AI-enabled IoT,” said Chet Babla, vice president of solutions for Arm’s IoT Device IP. “Ensuring that IoT devices are secure is non-negotiable, and why Arm is working with partners such as NEC to shift the economics of security by providing the common framework that PSA enables.”
NEC is also planning to unveil the development of a box-type accelerator, a specialized device featuring real-time facial recognition that will be securely managed and provisioned by Arm Pelion Device Management.
The accelerator will be equipped with the Arm Cortex-A53 processor. The processor will accelerate the device’s facial recognition process and enable faster analytics by offloading the analytics workload carried out on servers or the cloud, thereby helping to reduce costs for networks and systems, NEC said.
NEC said it has already implemented over 700 biometric systems, including face recognition technologies, in more than 70 countries and regions throughout the world.
“We expect the new accelerator to promote further adoption of face recognition throughout many areas, including the public safety, entertainment and transportation fields, as it contributes to the security and convenience of consumers worldwide,” said Naoki Hashitani, SVP for NEC.
NEC has already begun developing a smart city project leveraging Arm technology in the resort town of Shirahama in western Japan. NEC aims to begin a proof of concept hospitality project with smart check-in and smart shopping features in December 2018. These services are expected to enable visitors to check in to hotel rooms and make cashless payments through the use of facial authentication.
