WGU D337 - Internet of Things (IoT) and Infrastructure (UPDATED) latest updated questions with 100% correct answers 2026 release

1st wave of IoT

Hardware breakthrough that aimed to connect everyday objects to a network

2nd wave of IoT

Developing new types of sensors and new technologies and protocols to support their deployment

3rd wave of IoT

Data collection, processing, analytics, and management, security, privacy, and trust

IoT ecosystem

Set of stakeholders that participate in the deployment of IoT technology and the relationship between them

Information provider

Owners of sensor deployments.

Collects and makes data available to others without giving up ownership rights of the information.

They also build dedicated services or applications.

Platform provider

Provides computing and storage infrastructure, analytics as well as AI capabilities

Application developers

Produce applications that process the available data within a specific context to produce actionable insight for end users.

End users

Private persons or institutional decision makers that use information and applications provided by other stakeholders

Cybersecurity

Practice of protecting information systems, networks, data and programs

Cyberspace

Network of hundreds of thousands of interconnected computers, servers, routers, switches and fiber optic cables that allow vital infrastructures to work

Digital

Technologies that generate, store and process data as fixed numbers; binary digits or bits in the form of 0's and 1's

Information systems

Combinations of hardware, software and networks that are integrated together to collect, process, store and distribute data

Information broker

Module used to store IoT data received from sensors or from the cloud

Internet

Global network of wired and wireless networks

Web

Information space consisting of a number of public resources that are linked together and made accessible via the internet

Cyber terrorists

Uses cyberspace to disrupt critical infrastructures to elicit widespread panic and loss of public confidence in the ability of government to function effectively, such as by interrupting critical infrastructure

Cybercrime

A financially motivated cyber attack where attackers use cyberspace to steal users' identities or credentials to direct or redirect money to their own accounts.

Cyberwar

Involves using the cyberspace to cause conflicts among governments, especially the deliberate attacking of information systems for strategic or military purposes and can also involve conventional (kinetic) attacks.

Cyber espionage

Involves state-on-state activities like targeting military plans or diplomatic information as well as stealing classified data, sensitive data, or intellectual property to gain an advantage over a competitive company or government entity.

Consumer IoT

All the user's networks around their personal and home devices

Industrial IoT

Machines, computers and people enabling intelligent industrial operations using advanced data analytics for transformation business outcomes

Commercial IoT

Delivers the benefits of IoT to business venues like supermarkets, stores, commercial office buildings, hotels, healthcare facilities, and entertainment venues.

Infrastructure IoT

Focused on the development of smart infrastructures that incorporate IoT technologies to boost efficiency, cost savings, and maintenance, including the ability to monitor and control operations of urban and rural infrastructures.

Internet of Bodies (IoB)

Connected devices that monitor the human body, collect physiological, biometric, or behavioral data and exchange information of a wireless or hybrid network. Can be implanted, swallowed or worn.

Internet of Things (IoT)

Network of physical objects (things) that are embedded with sensors, software, and other technologies for the purpose of connecting and exchanging data with other devices and systems over the internet.

Wireless Metropolitan Area Network (WMAN)

Type of wireless networking that has an intended coverage area of approximately the size of a city. Spans a larger area than a WLAN but smaller than a wireless wide area network (WWAN)

Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN)

Wireless distribution method for two or more devices. Uses high-frequency radio waves and often include an access point to the internet. Mid-range. An example is Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11)

Campus Area Network (CAN)

Computer network that spans a limited geographic area. Interconnect multiple local area networks (LANs) within an educational or corporate campus.

Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN)

Short-distance, energy efficient, high-data rate network that allows multiple devices within a small area to connect to each other.

Examples are Bluetooth and Zigbee.

Sensors

Devices that respond to inputs from the physical environment and use those inputs for decision-making by displaying the inputs, transmitting them for additional processing, or using them in conjunction with artificial intelligence

Sensor data

Measurements of physical property or query of data, is the initial value required for metadata to be gathered. Data consist of numeric values, each with a time and an optional location which is require for mobile sensor. Fixed sensors location is a contextual property of the sensor. Extended Environments Markup Language (EEML) represents this information type

Actuator

Device that converts an electrical signal into a corresponding physical quantity such as movement, force, or sound

IoT devices

Simple networked devices such as sensors and actuators that are installed close to the data source or control interfaces. Usually connected a customer edge device via 3G, 4G, 5G, Wi-Fi, PCIe, USB or Ethernet within an edge computing application scenario.

Edge processing

A process of data aggregation, manipulation, bandwidth reduction, and other logic directly on an IoT sensor or device

Access network

Part of a network which is concerned with moving data to and from a sensor or edge device to a backhaul network

Gateway

Building block used to move collected data (from sensors) to the central IoT platform.

Low-Power Wide-Area Network (LP-WAN)

Lower than 1 GHz, 868 MHz in EU called ISM (Industrial, Scientific, and Medicine) band,

USA 915 MHz

Several techs that use this band are Sigfox, LoRaWAN, and Weightless. (Unlicensed) have lower data rates compared to normal cellular ones (Licensed). Long-range, energy-efficient. Wireless wide area network technology that interconnects low-bandwidth, battery-powered devices with low bit rates over long ranges and can be delivered through cellular networks

Listen then talk

approach in unlicensed spectrum to avoid collisions, but this has an impact on battery life, while others just transmit and wait for an acknowledgment, and if no acknowledgment is received, the device then resends according to pre‐set algorithms.

WLAN

Group of collocated computers or other devices that form a network based on radio transmissions rather than wired connections

WPAN

Network for interconnecting devices centered around an individual person's workspace

Data rate, power availability, range, cost

What are the 4 things to consider when choosing IoT connectivity?

Customer Edge Device

Devices that receive data from and send commands to IoT devices. Provide limited local storage, processing, and networking functions through wireless access service for the sensors and actuators within its transmission range. Typically aimed at sensor data acquisition, data collection, data filtering, data normalization, and command or control of sensors and actuators. Acts on raw data, for instance filtering encoding, and encrypting local data streams at runtime.

Mobile Edge Computing (MEC)

Servers capable of reducing transmission costs and providing fast interactive responses in the computation off‐loading service. Suffers from resource limitation. Computer node that focuses on data aggregation, compression and transformation.

Centralized IoT platform

Powerful central storage and processing capability for IoT use cases such as data interoperability and uniform data access. Handles management of IoT devices for remote management. Deployed on cloud resources. Afford unlimited workloads potentially handled in large-scale edge computing.

UNB (Ultra-Narrow Band)

Systems transmit the signal in a small amount of spectrum, usually less than 1 kHz, and are particularly suitable for small amounts of data. There is a challenge if the end device is moving fast, as the Doppler Effect can induce frequency variations that are relatively large compared to the signal bandwidth, which makes detection and demodulation of the signal more difficult. Examples are Weightless and Sigfox

Spread spectrum

Technique in which the signal is transmitted on a bandwidth that is much bigger than the original frequency (~ 125 kHz) to decrease interference and increase security

Zigbee, Bluetooth, and Wi-fi

Short‐ and mid‐range wireless networks suitable for scenarios where the device is close to the receiving gateway, such as wearable devices, homes, offices, cars, and factories.

LoRaWAN (Long-range (LoRa) Low-Power Wide Area Network

Based on a protocol from Semtech operating at the physical layer.

Is asynchronous and uses Spread spectrum.

Suitable for dense deployments such as buildings or cities. Covers high level protocols. Chirp (FM) spread spectrum. Conserve battery life.

Asynchronous protocol

Meaning end devices control when they send data and when they can sleep, providing extended battery life. Ex: LoRaWan

Synchronous protocol

Device regularly has to connect to the network even when no data are being sent. Reduce battery life. Ex: NB-IoT

Zigbee

IEEE 802.15.4, Short-ranged network solution capable of meshing to form longer range networks, and have a master controller every so often that is linked back to other networks.

SigFox

Named for company that owns it.

Used in Narrowband (200 kHz)

Suitable for dense deployments such as buildings or cities. Very low data messages (long range, low noise). Relies on a frequency hopping algorithm for message delivery (device sends each message three times on three different frequencies). Uses a mixture of DBPSK and GFSK modulation, and each message is 100 Hz wide

Bluetooth and ZigBee

Wireless personal area networks (WPANs) used to deliver short-range, energy-efficient, and high data rate.

Sigfox and LoRa

Low-power wide-area networks (LP-WANs) used to deliver long-range, energy-efficient, low data rates.

Extended Coverage-GSM (EC-GSM) and Narrow Band (NB-IoT)

Cellular technologies used to deliver long range flexible data rates.

Cellular (2G/3G/4G networks

Standardized by the 3GPP provide mid‐ to long‐range capabilities. Initially designed for voice communications, subsequently enabled for data communications, while the next generation (5G) of cellular networks are enabling very diverse application requirements, including those for IoT.

5G Technical Advances and Key Use Cases

1.1 eSIM

1.2 Additional frequency bands for higher bandwidths

1.3 Migration to NFV

1.4 Place functionality closer to the end of the network to reduce critical service delay

2.1 eMBB

2.2 URLLC

2.3 mMTC

Satellite Communications

Increasingly being used to connect remote devices, such as monitoring in the polar regions or in other remote areas such as oceans, and are widely used for location services via GPS. Being rather expensive and battery consuming, such networks are typically used for critical or very special applications

Wired Networks

Suitable for CCTV cameras and sensors that track customer movements in a retail environment.

Weightless

Consists of three protocols (W,P,N), works on 2.4 band. Has a bandwidth of 12.5 KHz. Solution is considered a LPWAN and falls under UNB

Weightless-W

Leveraged TV Whitespace, developed by a company called Neul (Original)

Weightless-N

Unlicensed spectrum narrow-band protocol based on technology from NWave

Weightless-P

Based on technology donated by M2COMM

Narrow Band Internet of Things (NB-IoT or LTE-M2)

Designed to be lower power consumption, increase system capacity, spectrum efficiency, and range. Synchronous protocol.

Deployment Option = LTE in band or guard band

Max bandwidth = 180 MHz

LTE-M (LTE-M1 or CAT-M1)

LTE chips built for IoT, higher throughput and lower battery life than NB-IoT but cost more (specific use cases for LPWAN applications where there is a need for higher bandwidth and/or the ability to support voice calls)

Deployment = In-band LTE

Max bandwidth = 1.4 MHz

Extended Coverage - GSM (EC-GSM)

IoT-optimized network, deployed with software upgrade.

Deployment Options = In-band GSM.

Max bandwidth = 200 MHz

Enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB)

Provision of higher data rates to mobile devices to support uses such as ultra‐high definition video, virtual reality, interactive gaming. (not necessary for IoT)

URLLC (Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communication)

Mission critical use cases where very low network latency (<10 ms) is vital such as industrial automation, remote surgery, traffic safety and control, autonomous vehicles.

mMTC (Massive Machine Type Communications)

To support huge number of devices in the future such as smart homes/buildings, smart agriculture and asset tracking. Dense deployment. 1 million cpskm and Battery up to 10 yrs

Customer Premises Edge Compute (C-PEC)

Computing devices installed on the customer's premises adjacent to their sensors, LAN, or IoT devices. Very low latency (sub 10ms), dedicated devices to single tenant, and moderate compute workloads. Data remains on premises (local) and customer has more control. Computing devices use X86 or ARM processor architectures

Communication Service Provider Premises Edge Compute (CSP-PEC)

Computing resources such as MEC servers being installed in the domain, and in the case of 5G adjacent to eNodeB and the Radio Access Network (RAN). Low latency cloud service enabling latency intolerant applications local to sensors. Low latency (sub 20ms), devices run applications for multiple tenants, and high compute workloads. MEC style represents large compute installs and offer cloud size scaling. Requires more processing, storage, and communication capacity than C-PEC level

Edge Computing

Model of providing data processing geographically close to critical assets such as sensors, actuators, IoT objects, and humans. Devices are based on X86 and ARM

Network Connectivity for Edge Compute Devices (LAN)

A hub for connecting IoT devices and technologies supported by Wi-Fi, Ethernet, Bluetooth, ZigBee, and industrial systems like CAN (controller area network) bus. Scenarios where physical connection to sensors is required; GPIO provides either on-board or via PCIE GPIO expansion card. GPIO connector also allows additional devices to be connected to the board.

Network Connectivity for Edge Compute Devices (WAN)

Required for connectivity to the centralized IoT platform. Supplied through technologies such as 3‐5G cellular, xDSL, and long range (LORA). Along this line NFV and SDN are currently used to support data transition between edge nodes (whether MEC servers or customer edge devices) and the centralized IoT platform.

NFV (Network Function Virtualization)

Enables the operator to meet a range of different network requirements using the same physical infrastructure quickly and easily via software re‐configuration.

Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) and Software‐Defined Networking (SDN)

Employed in order to support data transition between edge nodes (whether MEC servers or customer edge devices) and the centralized IoT platform. Modern approaches of building, designing, and operating networks. Significantly enhance management and dynamism of the network. Example: Dynamically changing the data path between the edge nodes and the centralized IoT platform will be possible when the network quality is not suitable enough at runtime.

GPIO (general‐purpose input/output)

For scenarios where a physical connection to sensors is required. Capability will be provided either on‐board the device itself (i.e. Raspberry PI) or via a PCIE expansion card. Connector also allows additional devices (e.g. sensors or LED (light‐emitting diode) bulbs) to be connected to the board.

Colocation

Reduces distances, latency, and in many cases solution complexity that results in a better outcome for customers and end-users

Communications Service Provider (CSP)

Domain the infrastructure will be shared by a number of customers

IoT Runtime Environment (IRE)

Provides additional functionality beyond the container management level that enables remote management of information flows between multiple IoT applications and external endpoints, allows specific applications to be chained together, enabling data to be transformed, contextualized, and communicated to other systems

Device management

Areas of initial device configuration and on-going management. Shipped device to site contains OS and DM agent. On initial boot, device connects to WAN and downloads software and configuration necessary for Day-0 status. Enables remote access to the device, network, applications, throughput, and health, as well as enabling start, shutdown, and restart of the device remotely.

Secure Runtime Environment (SRE)

Component represents a comprehensive collection of tools that reduce the attack space through measures such as identity access management (IAM), secure boot, device attestation, TPMs, and trusted execution environments (TEEs)

Raspberry PI (RPI 3)

Range of devices as the foundation of a simple C‐PEC solution. Necessary compute power to support the development phase of IoT applications, has GPIO pins to allow the attachment of sensors and actuators, and the basic Linux OS comes with a number of powerful development applications. Based around ARM.

Python

Common open‐source language interpreter on Linux platforms, with excellent access to network, input/output (IO), and a rich set of lightweight built‐in data formatting libraries. Used by google, NASA, Yahoo and CERN. Used for a wide range of edge computing applications, for example scientific computing, information security, embedded applications, AI algorithms, and web development.

NodeJS (Javascript for servers)

Open‐source run‐time environment that runs in a very small footprint. Each container instance that consists of an application written by this language needs some packages and a certain amount of memory for a JVM

Node-RED

Built on NodeJS, flow-based development tool meant for IoT. Easy-to-use drag-and-drop development environment that minimizes programming efforts. comes pre‐ configured with Nodes (or adapters) to MQTT and GPIO pins (in the case of RPI 3).

MQTT Protocol

IoT connectivity protocol that is designed as an extremely lightweight publish/subscribe messaging transport. Useful for connections with remote locations where a small code footprint is required or network bandwidth needs to be significantly considered.

Edge Computing Frameworks

Next wave of software infrastructure for C‐PEC style devices. Provide a high degree of standardization with regard to development, operation, and management of applications. Should improve software reuse, increase innovation and result in more efficient use of computing resources. Supports functions to include the following modules: Protocol Adapter, Information Broker, Rules Engine, Use Case Specific and Management & Security

Protocol adapter

Protocol specific module enabling the transformation of incoming sensor data or outgoing actuator commands to a common format. Example: Modbus protocol adapter can be used to read or set motor revolutions per minute (RPM) or direction when configured accordingly

Rules Engine

Module to route the incoming data from other modules based on predefined rules

Use case specific

Module that is produced by a developer to perform a specialist function

Management and Security

Module that allows registration of the IoT device to the system and manages modules and configuration, handles security features like IAM and attestation of the software stack

Zero-Touch Device Onboarding (ZDO)

Solution means that when a device first connects to the network, it registers itself automatically and securely as a bona fide and fully trusted device into the centralized IoT platform, and immediately enables secure self‐monitoring and maintenance over the air (OTA); Invocated by British Telecommunications (BT) Group. Provides IoT standards such as Open Mobile Alliance (OMA), Lightweight Machine to Machine (LWM2M), over Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP), on User Datagram Protocol (UDP), and secured with Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS). Has been implemented in various proofs of concept prototypes, covering the whole lifecycle of an IoT device.

Attestation and Bootstrapping servers

Components introduced in Secure and ZDO Blueprint. The first server establish the trust between the IoT management servers and a remote endpoint using third party solutions. The second server automatically prepares and encapsulates the necessary protocols, firmware, applications, and device management agents for each device. Applications and configurations are then sent to the raw device automatically, using the secure channel established by the first server

Attestation Server

Establish the trust between the IoT management servers and a remote endpoint using third party solutions. Applications and configurations created by the bootstrapping server are sent to to the raw device using a secure channel established by this server

Bootstrapping Server

Automatically prepares and encapsulates the necessary protocols, firmware, applications, and device management agents for each device.

Fog

Structures between data-producing nodes and central cloud processing servers

Fog Computing

A subset of edge computing using fog resources. Moves edge computing activities to local area network (LAN) hardware or processors connected to it. May be physically farther from the data-capturing sensors compared to edge computing. Operates with the cloud rather than outside of it which helps make smarter data processing choices. Primary advantage is reduced response time for IoT devices, as it allows for processing to occur closer to the data source, minimizing the delay that can occur with cloud computing.

Information consumer

Builds apps that use data from various sources after obtaining consent to use data

HyperCat

Specification for representing and exposing IoT platform catalogues over Web technologies, uses JSON and URI. Expose catalogue information resources in a machine-readable form. Designed for general purpose (small core of capabilities). Simple text matching (of relation-value pairs), prefix-based, lexicographic, and geographic searches.

Discovery = Yes

Access Control = Limited - hints of access control and credential acquisition.

Data Access = No