Wireless transmission of data is enabled with several technologies, for example cellular or Wi-Fi. But what if the visible light is used as a transmission medium?
The answer lies in a technology called Li-Fi, which uses light emitted from LED bulbs to transmit data.
Wireless transmission of data is enabled with several technologies, for example cellular or Wi-Fi. But what if the visible light is used as a transmission medium?
The answer lies in a technology called Li-Fi, which uses light emitted from LED bulbs to transmit data at rates of up to 224 Gigabits per second, compared with 1 Gbit/s for Wi-Fi. This is not a fantasy. In fact, commercialization will take place more quickly than one thinks, according to Peter Mason, Senior Tutor at Tavcom Training who spoke at a forum during IFSEC 2017.
"You walk around the show here and you'll see no Li-Fi products. You come here next year and will see no Li-Fi products. You come here in 2018 and 2019 and you'll see no Li-Fi products. By 2020 Li-Fi will be worth billions and billions of pounds a year,” Mason said.
The potential of Li-Fi has to do with the current limitations of Wi-Fi, which according to Mason include dwindling spectrum, rates of only 1 Gbit/s, vulnerability to security compromise and heavy energy consumption.
It’s against this backdrop that Li-Fi can present itself as an ideal alternative. With this technology, data is fed to an LED bulb, which then sends data embedded in its beam to the receiver of a smart or personal device. The light is modulated at a rapid speed that’s not detectable by the human eye.
“Data is ones and zeros. For binary 1 we'll use full light, and for binary 0 we'll use a little bit less light, so light is going up and down but it'll be so fast it doesn’t seem to be flickering,” Mason said, adding Li-Fi offers even more advantages over Wi-Fi, for example working in a spectrum 100,000 times that of Wi-Fi, enabling data rates of up to 224 Gbit/s, and invulnerability to hacks and data intrusion that’s seen frequently with the Wi-Fi technology.
Applications will be wide-ranging and will include security. “Anything that is short-range, high-bandwidth, and high-bandwidth is a perfect application. Does that sound like CCTV?” Mason asked. “The nice thing about Li-Fi is we can then transmit data without compression. Also, there's no latency when you use light for the transmission – light has no idea what delay or latency is about.”
According to Mason, Li-Fi is already being trialed in Singapore and Dubai, where streetlights have been turned into Li-Fi hotspots, enabling instant and continuous connectivity for smartphones enabled with this technology.
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