Management of internet of things (IoT) by security fabric

1. A computer-implemented method in a network security system communicatively coupled to a data communication network for automatically applying network security policies to Internet of Things (IoTs) for individualized for private network subscribers, the method comprising:

providing a subscription service, by an analyzing tier of the network security system, for a plurality of subscribers, each at a private network assessable remotely to the network security system over the data communication network;

collecting for the subscribers, by the analyzing tier of the network security system, data of IoT devices from a plurality of data sources on a plurality of private networks including network traffic logs, data packet samples and configuration information of internal IoT devices, wherein the analyzing tier is cloud-based;

abstracting for the subscribers, by the analyzing tier of the network security system, profiled element baselines (PEBs) of IoT devices on the plurality of private networks from the data, wherein each of the PEBs includes characteristics of an IoT device;

retrieving for the subscribers, by an executing tier of the network security system on one of the plurality of private networks, the PEBs from the analyzing tier of the network security system, wherein the executing tier of the network security system is configured to control network traffic of one or more IoT devices of the one of the plurality of private networks;

collecting from the subscribers, by the analyzing tier of the network security system, environmental information about the plurality of networks and network security policies of the one of the plurality of private networks;

modifying the PEBs, by the analyzing tier of the network security system, based on local environmental information of a specific private network hosting the one or more IoT devices;

generating, by the executing tier of the network security system at the specific private network, one or more security policies for one or more IoT devices from the modified PEBs of the one or more IoT devices;

controlling, by the executing tier of the network security system at the specific private network, network traffic of the one or more IoT devices of the specific private network to comply with the one or more security policies of the modified PEB;

retrieving, by an adapting tier of the network security system, the PEBs from the analyzing tier of the network security system, wherein the adapting tier of the network security system is configured to collect local network environment information;

generating, by the adapting tier of the network security system, modified PEBs by tailoring the PEBs to accommodate the local network environment;

retrieving, by the executing tier of the network security system, the modified PEBs from the adapting tier of the network security system; and

generating, by the executing tier of the network security system, the one or more security policies for the one or more IoT devices from the modified PEBs,

wherein the analyzing tier of the network security system classifies the characteristics of the type of IoT device into rigid and discretionary classes of security roles, wherein the characteristics of rigid class are mandatory to be implemented at the adapting tier and executing tier of the network security system and the characteristics of discretionary class are optional or adaptive at adapting tier or executing tier of the network security system.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the analyzing tier of the network security system is hosted at a public cloud infrastructure, a private cloud infrastructure, or a local network infrastructure.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the plurality of data sources include the executing tier of the network security system, an adapting tier of the network security system, manufacturers of IoT devices and public data sources from other networks.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein each of the PEBs comprises configuration characteristics and network activity characteristics of an IoT device.

5. The method of claim 4 , wherein the configuration characteristics of the IoT device comprise at least one of:

a manufacturer;

hardware configurations;

an operating system;

a software version;

a firmware version;

authentications; and

certificates.

6. The method of claim 4 , wherein the activity characteristics comprise at least one of:

one or more communication protocols supported by the IoT device;

one or more services supported by the IoT device;

one or more remote services accessed by the IoT device;

one or more ports used by the IoT device;

communication pattern of the IoT device;

IP header of the IoT device;

HTTP header information of the IoT device with remote web servers; and

scheduling, traffic shaping, network bandwidth of the IoT device.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprises:

intercepting, by the executing tier of the network security system, network traffic from/to the one or more IoT devices of the private network;

determining, by the executing tier of the network security system, when the network traffic from/to the one or more IoT devices is in compliance with the security policies;

allowing, by the executing tier of the network security system, the network traffic when the network traffic is in compliance with the security policies; and

blocking, by the executing tier of the network security system, the network traffic when the network traffic is not in compliance with the security policies.

8. The method of claim 1 further comprises:

detecting, by the executing tier of the network security system, a malicious operation of an IoT device from network traffic of the IoT device;

blocking, by the executing tier of the network security system, the malicious operation of the IoT device.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the malicious operation is Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack initiated from the IoT device.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein the executing tier of the network security system further provides one or more of network security services to the one or more IoT devices based on at least one of the PEB's:

network firewalling;

virtual private network;

antivirus;

intrusion prevention (IPS);

content filtering;

data leak prevention;

antispam;

antispyware;

logging;

reputation-based protections;

event correlation;

network access control;

vulnerability management;

load balancing;

traffic shaping;

application detection;

traffic compression/decompression; and

traffic encryption/decryption.

11. The method of claim 1 further comprises:

updating the PEBs of the multiple types of IoT devices at the analyzing tier of the network security system based on data collected by the network security system from data sources;

distributing the updated PEBs from the analyzing tier to the adapting tier of the network security system; and

updating the modified PEBs at the adapting tier of the network security system in accordance with the update PEBs from the analyzing tier.

12. The method of claim 1 further comprises:

collecting, by the analyzing tier of the network security system, network traffic of multiple IoT devices of the same type that is captured by the plurality of data sources;

extracting, by the analyzing tier of the network security system, the characteristics of the type of IoT device from network traffic.

13. The method of claim 12 , wherein said extracting further comprises at least one of:

pattern recognition, statistical analysis and machine learning.