Difference between read and write access (data, IoT)

Question

i am a lawyer and currently writing an essay about data access in ioT environments. I often stumble over the distinction between read access and write access. Could someone provide me with an example, preferably in an ioT, mobile app oder plattform context.

(a little context for those who are interested: My argument is that many complementary IoT services require not just read but write access.)

Thank you very much!!

Answer 1

Reading data means looking at it. Writing data means changing it. This is fairly basic computing jargon.

For example, when you look at your bank statement online, that is a read; when you send money to someone, that is a write.

I hope you can see why writing might be considered more dangerous than reading.

The word "access" can mean the reading and writing itself, or it can mean whether they're allowed to read and write the data - it's often clear from the context. I could say that "I gave you read-only access to my bank account", which means I told the bank's computer system to allow you to look at my bank account, but not change it. Read-only access can help to mitigate security threats - if someone finds out your password, they can see what's in my account but they can't steal the money.

If a device needs write access to do its job, obviously you can't give it read-only access as a security mitigation, because then it wouldn't be able to do its job.