Bluetooth Basics

By Travis Willis

Today, most consumers are familiar with the Bluetooth protocol, which is a wireless technology for transferring data between two devices that are in proximity with each other. It has been implemented on all smartphones manufactured globally but also on millions of earphones, laptops, TVs, speakers, cars, medical and other critical devices. Nearly 4 billion Bluetooth devices were expected to ship in 2018, nearly twice as many as 2013 (2.4Bn). This year, 86% of new cars, trucks and SUVs shipped will come with Bluetooth standard.

The development of the "short-link" radio technology, later named Bluetooth, was initiated in 1989 by Nils Rydbeck, CTO at Ericsson Mobile and by Johan Ullman in Lund, Sweden. The specifications were formalized by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) and formally announced on May 20th, 1998. It was established by Ericsson, IBM, Intel, Toshiba and Nokia, and later joined by many other influential technology companies. Today the SIG has a membership of over 30,000 companies worldwide.

The name Bluetooth is an Anglicised version of the Scandinavian Bl?tand/Bl?tann (Old Norse blát?nn), the epithet of the tenth-century king Harald Bluetooth who united dissonant Danish tribes into a single kingdom. The implication is that Bluetooth unites communication protocols. The Bluetooth logo is a bind rune merging the Younger Futhark runes  (?, Hagall) and  (?, Bjarkan), Harald's initials.

Since its inception, Bluetooth has been regularly improved by the SIG, adding more security and faster data transfer rates amongst other improvements. In 2011, its fourth iteration introduced Bluetooth low energy (BLE) which uses the same frequency as traditional Bluetooth (2.4GHz) but requires much less power: about a tenth of what Bluetooth or Wifi would need for similar use cases. Bluetooth chipsets are relatively inexpensive to implement. With significant volume, each costs only a few dollars. Its presence in billions of devices makes it the most widely adopted Personal Area Network technology. With the growing demand for IoT based solutions, user’s need new and advanced features from their Bluetooth-based devices. The explosion of IoT devices will keep fueling this need for Bluetooth’s continued development. Bluetooth has the capability of revolutionizing how people experience the IoT in more ways than any other protocol.

Bluetooth 5.0 was announced to the public on June 16th, 2016 and was anticipated to be available in late 2016 or early 2017. With its release, developers were able to meet all the advanced needs of the wireless IoT world with enhanced privacy and security. It is setting the stage for the future development of the IoT.

Bluetooth 5.0 is the continuation of the Low Energy LE solutions being developed by the SIG. Its full power speed is up to 48MBps (double the last version). It can also be connected to a distance up to 300 meters or 985 feet (4 times the 4.2 version). The ISM band ranges from 2.4-2.485 GHz. 

7 key differences have emerged for BLE 5.0

Speed

Bluetooth 5.0 is faster, with the format having 2Mbps speed, or twice the speed of Bluetooth 4.2 which ran at 1 Mbps. Bluetooth 5.0 is better able to meet one of the critical IoT requirements for performance with this enhancement.

Range

Bluetooth 4.2 supports 50m in outdoor range and 10m in indoor range making it lower on the spectrum compared to Zigbee or Z-Wave. Bluetooth 5.0 supports 200m in Line-of-Sight path in the outdoor environment and 40m in the indoor environment. This is another significant improvement towards being a dominant force in IoT applications.

Power requirement

The Bluetooth 5.0 has been formulated to use less power per device compared to Bluetooth 4.2 That means you can keep your Bluetooth device switched on for a longer period without significant battery impacts.

Message Capacity

Bluetooth 5.0 has a larger message capacity of 255 bytes. This gives more bytes for actual data payload. Bluetooth 4.2 has a small message capacity of about 31 bytes which gives just 17 to 20 bytes for actual data payload.

Bluetooth beacon

Bluetooth 5.0 beacons have increased range and speed while also adding message capacity. Bluetooth 4.2 beacons have been less popular due to lower speed and range coupled with a low message capacity of 31 bytes. For beacons to be effective in an IoT setting they must perform at a level consistent with 5.0.

Support for IoT devices

Bluetooth 5.0 easily meets the requirements for the next generation of IoT devices with its new mesh networking capabilities which are many-to-many (or m:m). It is ideally suited for building automation, sensor network, asset tracking, and other IoT solutions that require tens, hundreds or thousands of devices to communicate with one another.

Compatibility

Bluetooth 4.2 works best with devices that are compatible with version 4 devices. Bluetooth 5.0 is backwards compatible with v1, v2, v3, v4, v4.1, and version 4.2 but those devices will not utilize all the features of Bluetooth 5.0.

End to End Security with pdqSMART

pdqSMART was designed with security being our top priority and that is why we use the SecuRemote BLE based wireless mesh network (WMN). The IoT is currently wide open with many companies charging into it without addressing their vulnerabilities. We have all seen the problems when manufacturers forsake security in their systems. Z-Wave and Zigbee technologies were originally developed for residential applications and not enterprise level systems. Some commercial manufacturers have chosen to use these technologies for enterprise business applications and they have unfortunately invited themselves to be attacked. The encryption protocols for these technologies are weaker and invite hackers to “sniff” keys and decrypt the communications. These keys can then be used to gain access to facilities.

pdqSMART is different from many of the systems currently promoting themselves in the market. We have complete End-to-End control over our system, starting with device provisioning, which occurs at our facilities and ends in our Microsoft Azure hosted Cloud environment. We use multifactor authentication and a complete End-to-End multi-layer AES128 encryption for all our communications. Each device gets a unique set of crypto keys which are embedded into the devices read only memory. All communications over BLE are then encrypted and only readable with the correct set of corresponding crypto keys. Every communication is part of a unique session which protects against replay attacks. The encryption is continuous from the lock to the mobile or hard credential Portal in the Cloud.

Our end points are more secure

Because pdqSMART deploys such a robust solution it is far less vulnerable to hacking attacks at its end points. We have all heard the stories about hackers gaining access through a connected thermostat to a building. While this may be a technology wive’s tail we all tell one another, the reality is networks that deploy less secure technologies are in fact vulnerable at their end points.

Locks are just the beginning. pdqSMART leverages the SecuRemote Wireless Mesh network not only for our locks but also for a myriad of other sensor solutions that the market is now demanding. The world is moving towards the Internet of Things (IoT) very rapidly, where different systems need to collect and exchange data. BLE plays a crucial role in IoT where sensors are connected wirelessly, forming a network and enabling data exchange between devices. The host device could be a smartphone that monitors and controls all the network nodes or our Hybrid Cloud Network Device. Such IoT applications include tracking your daily activities and home or building automation functionality like efficient lightning, monitoring, controlling temperature, humidity, along with consumer or business electronics, just to mention a few.

The Future is now

The systems of tomorrow are being designed and installed today. The latest generation of pdqSMART is designed to evolve forward by utilizing modular design and Over-The-Air (OTA) updates. For the first time you can invest in a system that will evolve with your business and its needs. pdqSMART is being designed to not only address your electronic access control needs but also your IoT video and building automation needs as well.

Simple. Secure. Flexible. Smart.