Logo of Inspur Group headquarters in Beijing seen on March 4 Photo: VCG

Despite the increasing popularity of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), there are still challenges for an industry takeoff, and data insecurity is the main impediment, said Sun Pishu, a deputy to the 13th National People's Congress (NPC) and chairman of Chinese server maker Inspur Group. 

The industrial internet combines the internet, platforms and security, constituting the internet infrastructures that connect people, devices and things.

"Enterprises are fully aware that the public cloud would be better than managing it themselves, while they are concerned about the risks of data leaks," Sun noted, adding that the government is worried about the data insecurity. People know that data sharing brings great value, but there are risks of data leaking. 

"Who should take the responsibility for that?" Sun asked.

Apart from Inspur, manufacturing enterprises such as Haier and Lenovo, and cloud service providers such as Aliyun and Huawei Cloud, have announced plans for IIoT businesses. 

According to a report released at the launch ceremony of the McKinsey IIoT Hub in February, the progress of the IIoT remains slow in many companies, including those in China.

The report said that despite China's remarkable progress in the IIoT, significant challenges remain. The biggest hurdles include getting information technology and operational technology to converge at scale. A lack of resources, the absence of multiyear digital strategies, and a shortage of top management and support are also hurdles ahead.

Sun suggested that China should strengthen punishment for data leakers. 

"At present, the problem of data leakage in China is often due to the lack of responsibility of internet service providers, their internal management loopholes, and unclear regulatory responsibilities," Sun said. 

"A comparative case is how the US government treats Facebook's data leaks, which could provide some guidance for us," he added.

China on Monday vowed to establish a standard system for the industrial internet by 2020, according to a guideline jointly released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Standardization Administration, a report from the Xinhua News Agency showed.

To fulfill the target, China will focus on formulating technical standards for crucial elements of the industry, including internet resource management and industrial big data. 

It will also formulate more than 100 standards and build a more integrated and open standard system by 2025, read the guideline.