Evolution of Interoperability Standards

Evolution of Interoperability Standards November 2024 Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 2 DOCUMENT JOINTLY PRODUCED BY INT:NET AIOTI StandICT CONTRIBUTORS Initiator Antonio Kung (FR, Trialog) Reviewer Laurent Guise (FR, EnergySemantic.com) Contributors Eric Simmon (US, NIST) Eric Lambert (FR, EDF) Karim Tobich (GB, IoT and cybersecurity expert) Jukka Alve (FI, SESKO) Tobbe Lahrin (SE, IoT and smart city expert) Emmanouil Spanakis (GR, FORTH) Xiaomi An (CN, RUC ontology expert) Dave Board (GB, Yokogawa) François Coallier (CA, ISO/IEC) Michael Mulquin (GB, Smart cities) Raul Castro (ES, UPM) INT:NET has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Programme, under Grant Agreement no 101070086. Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY This report provides first a landscape on interoperability standards, focusing on • ICT standards, o distributed systems, o cloud computing, and o internet of things and digital twin, and • application domain standards, o health, o energy. It then elaborates on the changing context concerning • the complexity of ecosystems or socio-technical systems, • the increasing number of policies and regulations, and • the evolution of interoperability frameworks. It then describes the expected evolution of standardisation practice for interoperability, consisting of moves towards • the interoperability of standards, • the interoperability of concepts and architectures across multiple standardization instanes, and • the interoperability of systems in complex ecosystems. The report concludes with a call to anticipate a new ecosystem of standardisation practices. Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 4 CONTENTS Executive Summary .............................................................................................................................. 3 Contents ................................................................................................................................................ 4 1 Introduction .............................................................................................................................. 5 2 Landscape on Interoperability Standards ............................................................................. 6 2.1 ICT Standards .................................................................................................................... 6 2.1.1 Distributed Systems ............................................................................................ 6 2.1.2 Cloud Computing ................................................................................................ 6 2.1.3 Internet of Things and Digital Twin ...................................................................... 7 2.2 Application Domain Standards ........................................................................................... 8 2.2.1 Health .................................................................................................................. 8 2.2.2 Energy ................................................................................................................. 9 2.3 Conformity Assessment Standards .................................................................................. 11 3 The Changing Context ........................................................................................................... 13 3.1 Ecosystems or Socio-technical Systems .......................................................................... 13 3.2 Policies and Regulations .................................................................................................. 14 3.3 Interoperability Frameworks ............................................................................................. 14 4 Evolution of Standardisation Practice for Interoperability ................................................ 17 4.1 Interoperability of Standards ............................................................................................. 17 4.2 Interoperability of Concepts and Architectures ................................................................. 17 4.3 Interoperability of Systems ............................................................................................... 18 5 Conclusion: Towards a New Ecosystem of Standardisation Practice .............................. 20 Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 5 ! Introduction The recent Crowdstrike outage1 was a typical example of cascading effects. A routine security software update was initiated. Upon executing, the security software was instructed to read an entry that was out of memory, thus causing the operating system to crash2. The effect of the update was seen very early on since the update was stopped within 80 minutes. Further the fix could be developed in a couple of hours, but its deployment took place about one week later. It can be claimed that this outage can also be seen as a failure of the interoperability assurance process, or of behavioral interoperability: while the software update function was operational, the effect of the software update was not well tested. This report provides an analysis on the evolution of interoperability standards and shows that it should or will evolve into directions to address the growing complexity of ICT infrastructure systems, or ICT ecosystems. The report first provides an overview on standards on interoperability, at the ICT level, at the domain level, as well as at the conformance assessment level. It then describes challenges they need to address in terms of ecosystems complexity, of policies and regulation constraints, and of interoperability frameworks. It finally provides an analysis on how some key standardisation undertakings can be leveraged and combined to address these challenges: • standards to support the interoperability of standards, • standards to support the interoperability of concepts and of architectures, and • standards to support the assurance of interoperable systems. Abbreviations IEC International Electrotechnical Commission IHE Integrating the Healthcare Enterprise IoT Internet of Things ISO International Organization for Standardization ITU-T International Telecommunication Union Telecommunication Standardization Sector JTC Joint Technical Committee OSI Open Systems Interconnection RFC Request for Comment RM-ODP Reference Model of Open Distributed Processing SC Sub Committee TC Technical Committee TCP/IP Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol 1 The computer outage of July 19, 2024 was caused by a faulty update of Falcon Sensor, software from the cybersecurity company CrowdStrike. This defective update caused the blocking of 8.5 million computers and servers worldwide. It was estimated in August 2023 that the outage will cost $5.4 billion in damages to the 500 largest US companies (https://fortune.com/2024/08/03/crowdstrike-outage-fortune-500-companies-5-4-billion-damages-uninsured-losses/).. 2 See https://www.crowdstrike.com/blog/falcon-content-update-preliminary-post-incident-report/ and https://www.crowdstrike.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Channel-File-291-Incident-Root-Cause-Analysis-08.06.2024.pdf Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 6 , Landscape on Interoperability Standards !.# ICT Standards !.#.# Distributed Systems Interoperability concerns can be traced back to the days of computing network methods in the late 1970s with the creation of an interoperability framework based on the OSI model as exemplified by • the joint work in the 1980s of ITU-T X.200 (open systems interconnection basic reference model) and ISO/IEC 7498-1, and • the publication of internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) or RFC 1122 This was followed by architecture work on RM-ODP (Reference model for Open distributed processing), jointly published by ITU-T (X.901 to X 904) and ISO/IEC (ISO/IEC 10746 serie). RM-ODP consisted of 4 parts: • an overview, • foundations, • architecture, • architecture semantics. The mentioned standards are listed in Table 1. Table 1 – Examples of distributed systems standards (ITU-T, ISO/IEC, IETF) Category Title Date URL Interoperability framework Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) Basic Reference Model ITU-T X-200 1988, 1994 https://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-X.200/ ISO/IEC 7498-1 1994 https://www.iso.org/standard/20269.html Requirements for Internet Hosts -- Communication Layers RFC 1122 1989 https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc1122 Architecture Open Distributed Processing (ODP) Reference Model Overview ITU-T X-901 1997 https://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-X.901/en ISO/IEC 10746-1 1998 https://www.iso.org/standard/20696.html Foundations ITU-T X-902 1995, 2009 https://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-X.902/en ISO/IEC 10746-2 1996, 2009 https://www.iso.org/standard/55723.html Architecture ITU-T X-903 1995, 2009 https://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-X.903/en ISO/IEC 10746-3 1996, 2009 https://www.iso.org/standard/55724.html Architectural semantics ITU-T X-904 1997 https://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-X.903/en ISO/IEC 10746-4 1998 https://www.iso.org/standard/20698.html !.#.! Cloud Computing Recently established subcommittees in JTC 13 have followed the same pattern of standard categories to address high-level guidance on interoperability: • standards on use cases, vocabulary, concepts; • standards on architecture; and • standards on an interoperability framework. ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 38 (Cloud computing and distributed platforms) was established in 2009, with interoperability concerns relating to the networking of elements providing cloud services. The subcommittee • started publishing standards on cloud vocabulary with ISO/IEC 17788 in 2014, later replaced by ISO/IEC Ed1 22123-1 in 2021, and 2023; 3 Information on the history of JTC1 subcommittees can be found in https://jtc1info.org/sd-2-history/ Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 7 • started publishing standards on cloud architecture with ISO/IEC 17789 in 2014, later replaced by ISO/IEC 22123-3 in 2023; and then • started publishing standards on cloud interoperability with ISO/IEC 19941 in 2017, to be replaced by a new edition under development. Mentioned cloud computing standards are showed in Table 2. Table 2 – Examples of cloud computing standards (ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 38) Category TItle Date URL Use cases, vocabulary and concepts Overview and vocabulary ISO/IEC 17788 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/60545.html Vocabulary ISO/IEC 22123-1 2021, 2023 https://www.iso.org/standard/82759.html Concepts ISO/IEC 22123-2 2021, 2023 https://www.iso.org/standard/80351.html Architecture Reference architecture ISO/IEC 17789 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/60545.html ISO/IEC 22123-3 2023 https://www.iso.org/standard/82759.html Interoperability framework Interoperability and portability ISO/IEC 19941 2017, 2024 https://www.iso.org/standard/87817.html !.#.7 Internet of Things and Digital Twin ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 41 (Internet of things and digital twin), was established in 2016, initially focusing on the Internet of Things (IoT), and in 2020 on digital twins. IoT interoperability deals with the connectivity of cyber physical systems through sensors and actuators. Digital twin interoperability deals with the connectivity of digital twins with the physical entity. The subcommittee • started publishing standards on IoT vocabulary with ISO/IEC 20924 in 2018, 2021, and in 2023 to cover both IoT and digital twins; • started publishing standards on IoT architecture with the publication of ISO/IEC 30141 in 2018, later replaced by a second edition in 2024, the development of ISO/IEC 40141 as a guidance document, complemented by the publication of ISO/IEC 30147 and ISO/IEC 30149 on trustworthiness. • started publishing standards on IoT interoperability with the publication of ISO/IEC 21823 series (IoT interoperability), with part 1 on the framework in 2019, part 2 on the transport facet in 2020, part 3 on the semantic facet in 2021, part 4 on the syntactic facet in 2022, and part 5 on the behavioural and policy facets (under development). At this point there is no specific standard on digital twin interoperability. It is however addressed in ISO/IEC 30188 (Digital twin reference architecture) which is under development. Mentioned Internet of things standards are showed in Table 3. Table 3 – Examples of internet of things standards (ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 41) Category Title Date URL Use cases, vocabulary and concepts IoT Vocabulary ISO/IEC 20924 2018, 2021 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/66217 IoT and digital twin - Vocabulary ISO/IEC 20924 2024 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/70408 Architecture IoT Reference architecture ISO/IEC 30141 2018, 2024 https://www.iso.org/standard/88800.html Digital twin reference architecture ISO/IEC 30188 Development https://www.iec.ch/dyn/www/f?p=103:38:411109607 072878::::FSP_ORG_ID,FSP_APEX_PAGE,FSP_P ROJECT_ID:20486,23,104896 Guidance on reference architecture ISO/IEC TR 40141 2024 https://www.iec.ch/ords/f?p=103:38:710954471973 193::::FSP_ORG_ID,FSP_APEX_PAGE,FSP_PRO JECT_ID:20486,23,126453 IoT Trustworthiness Integration in ISO/IEC/IEEE 15288 system engineering processes ISO/IEC 30147 2021 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/62644 IoT Trustworthiness principles ISO/IEC TS 30149 2024 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/67281 Interoperability framework Framework ISO/IEC 21823-1 2019 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/60604 Transport interoperability ISO/IEC 21823-2 2020 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/61085 Semantic interoperability ISO/IEC 21823-3 2021 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/61088 Syntactic interoperability ISO/IEC 21823-4 2022 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/65649 Behavioural and policy interoperability ISO/IEC 21823-5 Development https://www.iec.ch/ords/f?p=103:38:6047461127720 42::::FSP_ORG_ID,FSP_APEX_PAGE,FSP_PROJ ECT_ID:20486,23,108353 Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 8 !.! Application Domain Standards On the other hand, well established committees focusing on application domain standards further develop interoperability standards. We cover two application domains: health and energy. !.!.# Health In the health domain, ISO TC 215 (Health informatics), established in 1998, addresses the interchange and use of health-related data: • standards on architecture with the publication of the ISO 12967 series on service architecture in 2009, updated and 2020, with part 1 on the enterprise viewpoint, part 2 on the information viewpoint and part 3 on the computational viewpoint; this was followed by the publication in 2021 of ISO 23903 on an interoperability and integration reference architecture; • standards on interoperability protocols with the publication of HL7 version 2 message system in 1987, the publication of HL7 version 3 message system in 2011, and the publication of HL7 FHIR in 2011; • standards on information models, with the publication of the reference information model (RIM) in 1996, with ISO/HL7 21731 in 2006 and 2014, the publication of the HL7 clinical document architecture, with ISO/HL7 27932 in 2009, and the publication of ISO 13972 in 2022 on clinical information models; further, the publication in 2014 of the ISO 13606 series on electronic health record communication, with part 1 on a reference model, part 2 on archetype interchange specification, part 3 on archetypes and term list, part 4 on security and part 5 on interface specifications; • standards on interoperability frameworks, with the publication of the ISO 22600 series in 2014 on privilege management and access control, with part 1 on overview and policy management, part 2 on formal models and part 3 on implementations, and • standards on interoperability profiles based on the work from IHE4, with the publication in 2014 of the ISO 28380 series list protocol standards, with part 1 on the process, part 2 on integration and content profiles and part 3 on deployment. Mentioned health standards are showed in Table 4. Note that the rate of evolution on information can be huge in health, considering for instance the WHO international classification of diseases5, so it is likely that a wealth of new standards will be provided in the future. Table 4 – Examples of health informatics standards (HL7, ISO TC215) Category Title Date URL Architecture Health informatics — Service architecture (HISA) Enterprise viewpoint ISO 12967-1 2009, 2020 https://www.iso.org/standard/71037.html Information viewpoint ISO 12967-2 2009, 2020 https://www.iso.org/standard/71038.html Computational viewpoint ISO 12967-3 2009, 2020 https://www.iso.org/standard/71039.html Interoperability and integration reference architecture — Model and framework ISO TR 23903 2021 https://www.iso.org/standard/77337.html Interoperability protocol HL7 Version 2 Product Suite 1987-2011 https://www.hl7.org/implement/standards/pr oduct_brief.cfm?product_id=185 HL7 Version 3 Product Suite 2011 - 2014 https://www.hl7.org/implement/standards/pr oduct_brief.cfm?product_id=186 HL7 Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) 2011 - 2023 https://hl7.org/fhir/directory.html Information Model HL7 Version 3 — Reference Information Model (RIM) 1996 - 2021 https://www.hl7.org/implement/standards/ri m.cfm HL7 version 3 — Reference information model — Release 4 ISO/HL7 21731 2006, 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/61454.html HL7 Clinical Document Architecture 2000, 2005 https://www.hl7.org/implement/standards/pr oduct_brief.cfm?product_id=7 4 https://www.ihe.net/ 5 https://icd.who.int/en Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 9 Data Exchange Standards — HL7 Clinical Document Architecture, Release 2 ISO/HL7 27932 2009 https://www.iso.org/standard/44429.html Clinical information models — Characteristics, structures and requirements ISO 13972 2022 https://www.iso.org/standard/79498.html Electronic health record communication Reference model ISO 13606-1 2008, 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/67868.html Archetype interchange specification ISO 13606-2 2008, 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/62305.html Reference archetypes and term lists ISO 13606-3 2009, 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/62303.html Security ISO 13606-4 2009, 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/62306.html Interface specification ISO 13606-5 2010, 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/62304.html Interoperability framework Privilege management and access control Overview and policy management ISO 22600-1 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/62653.html Formal models ISO 22600-2 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/62654.html Implementations ISO 22600-3 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/62655.html Interoperability profile IHE global standards adoption Process ISO TR 28380-1 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/63383.html Integration and content profiles ISO TR 28380-2 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/46207.html Deployment ISO TR 28380-3 2014 https://www.iso.org/standard/61471.html !.!.! Energy In the energy domain, IEC committees such as SyC Smart Energy and TC57 (Power systems management and associated information exchange), address architecture, interoperability, information models and ontologies, or interoperability profiles: • Standards on architecture with the publication of the smart grid architecture model and associated interoperability framework by the CEN-CENELEC-ETSI SG-CG (smart grid coordination group) in 2012/2016 and transposed into an international System Reference Deliverable with IEC SRD 63200 in 2021 • Standards on interoperability with the publication in 2004 of the IEC 61850 standard series in the power utility automation domain6, e.g., IEC TR 61850-1 in 2017, IEC 61850-5 in 2013, or IEC 61850-7-1 in 2011. • Standards on information models and ontology with o the on-going development of a guide and plan to develop smart energy ontologies (IEC 63417), o the publication of core data models in the power utility domain, e.g., IEC 61850-7-2, and IEC 61850-7-3 and 7-4 for substations in 2010, with extensions to distributed energy resources with the IEC 61850-7-420 in 2021, to hydro power plants with IEC 61850-7-410 in 2012 or to wind farms IEC 61400-25 in 2016, and many other domains to come through transitional namespaces in the IEC 61850-90 series (Power quality, Condition maintenance and sensor network, Flexible alternate current transmission systems), o the publication of the common data dictionary, e.g., IEC 61360-1 in 2017, IEC 613604 on-line or IEC 61360-7 in 2024, o the publication of CIM or common information model, e.g., IEC 61970-1 and IEC 61970-2 in 2005, IEC 61970-301-v7 in 2020, IEC 61970-302-v2 in 2024, IEC 61970401 in 2022, IEC 61970-600-1 in 2021, IEC 61970-552 in 2016, IEC 61968-1 in 2020, o the publication of CGMES or common grid model exchanged standard, with IEC 61970-600-1 in 2021, 6 https://iec61850.dvl.iec.ch/ Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 16 NIST Framework for Smart grids 2020 https://www.nist.gov/ctl/smart-connected-systems-division/smartgrid-group/smart-grid-framework Systems interoperability group for healthcare https://www.nist.gov/itl/products-and-services/healthcarestandards-testing Interoperability of real-time public safety data https://www.nist.gov/system/files/documents/2019/06/27/nist.ir_.8 255.pdf Information technology and voting systems https://www.nist.gov/itl/voting/interoperability European union European Interoperability Framework 2010 https://web.archive.org/web/20160304233755/http://ec.europa.eu /isa/documents/isa_annex_ii_eif_en.pdf The New European Interoperability Framework 2017 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legalcontent/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52022PC0454 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/resource.html?uri=cellar:2c2f2554-0faf11e7-8a35-01aa75ed71a1.0017.02/DOC_3&format=PDF eHealth European Interoperability Framework 2012 https://publications.europa.eu/en/publication-detail/- /publication/3c5cc69d-7f06-42ab-bdfe-ede82307a8e2/languageen/format-PDF/source-52308887 CENCENELEC-ETSI Smart Grid interoperability framework (SGAM) with its first set of standards and associated methods 20122016 https://www.cencenelec.eu/areas-of-work/cen-cenelectopics/smart-grids-and-meters/smart-grids/ IEC IEC SRD 63200 extended Smart Grid interoperability framework 2019 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/62757 IEC TR 63097 Smart Grid roadmap 2017 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/publication/27785 IEC 62559 series : use cases methodology 2015 https://webstore.iec.ch/ Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 17 < Evolution of Standardisation Practice for Interoperability F.# Interoperability of Standards International standardization must work on two challenges. • The first challenge is to establish a standardization practice to build, produce and publish information models, meeting specific requirements associated to such digital content, i.e o Incremental Agility, time to market, maintenance, user feedbacks o Technical governance o Favoring the re-use of existing o Tooling (digital open collaboration platform) o Cross entity governance (breaking the silos – ensuring modelling occurs the closest to where the knowledge is) o Distribution (multi format (XML, RDF, OWL, XMI, paper, web, …), (free) access, trustworthiness) o Translation (each country may need to get the information model in its own set of human languages) o Profiling (standards or even specific to given groups of users) • The second challenge is the establishment of a practice of standard construction that enables the use of cross-cutting standards in vertical domains. To make it happen, this practice will require significant work in the coordination process between standardization committees on information models. Figure 1 shows examples of information models on o Horizontal technologies (e.g., artificial intelligence, virtual worlds, IoT, digital twins, DLT, quantum). o Cross-cutting characteristics (e.g., security, privacy, resilience, safety of sustainability), o Applications (e.g., health, energy, transport, manufacturing, finance), o Ecosystems (e.g., smart cities, conformity) Figure 1 – Examples of Information models F.! Interoperability of Concepts and Architectures International standardization must work on two challenges. Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 18 • The first challenge is to align the work on concept standards to ensure interoperability of concepts. Standards on concepts and information models can be defined by multiple committees. Coordination on their development and governance will have to be enhanced. The following standards can be mentioned for development, o ISO 704 (Terminology work — Principles and methods), o ISO 1087-1 (Terminology work — Vocabulary Part 1: Theory and application), o this is complemented by guides, such as the ISO/IEC Guide 77 serie (Guide for specification of product properties and classes) • The second challenge is to align the work on architecture standards to ensure interoperability of architectures. Standards on architecture can be defined by multiple committees. Coordination on their development will have to be enhanced. The following standards can be mentioned: o ISO/IEC/IEEE 42010 (architecture description), o ISO/IEC/IEEE 42020 (architecture process), o ISO/IEC/IEEE 42030 (architecture evaluation), o ISO/IEC/IEEE 42024 (architecture fundamentals), o ISO/IEC/IEEE 42042 (reference architecture), o ISO/IEC 40141 (guidelines on reference architectures), o ISO/IEC 30141 (IoT reference architecture). Table 10 lists the examples of concept and architecture standards. Table 10 – Examples of concept and architecture standards Category Title Data URL Concept Terminology work — Principles and methods ISO 704 2009, 2020 https://www.iso.org/standard/790 77.html Terminology work — Vocabulary Part 1: Theory and application ISO 1087-1 2000, 2019 https://www.iso.org/obp/ui/en/#is o:std:iso:1087:ed-2:v1:en Guide for specification of product properties and classes Fundamental benefits ISO/IEC Guide 77-1 2008 https://www.iso.org/standard/440 65.html Technical principles and guidance ISO/IEC Guide 77-2 2008 https://webstore.iec.ch/en/public ation/11954 Architecture Software, systems and enterprise Architecture description ISO/IEC/IEEE 42010 2022 https://www.iso.org/standard/743 93.html Architecture processes ISO/IEC/IEEE 42020 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/689 82.html Architecture evaluation framework ISO/IEC/IEEE 42030 2019 https://www.iso.org/standard/734 36.html Enterprise, systems and software Architecture fundamentals ISO/IEC/IEEE 42024 Development https://www.iso.org/standard/875 10.html Reference architectures ISO/IEC/IEEE 42042 https://www.iso.org/standard/873 10.html IoT reference architecture ISO/IEC Ed2 30141 2024 https://www.iso.org/standard/888 00.html Guidance on reference architecture ISO/IEC 40141 Development https://www.iec.ch/ords/f?p=103: 38:710954471973193::::FSP_O RG_ID,FSP_APEX_PAGE,FSP_ PROJECT_ID:20486,23,126453 F.7 Interoperability of Systems The changing context as explained above requires a more flexible and agile publication of interoperability profile standards to enabling the interoperability of systems. As showed in Figure 1, the interoperability of systems will benefit from a standardisation practice that is based on the following capabilities: • Interoperability of standards, through the SMART approach. Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 19 • Interoperability of concepts and architectures. Figure 2 – Roadmap on the evolution of standards International standardization must work on two challenges. • The first challenge is to ensure assurance and conformity assessment, when interoperability profile standards can involve elements defined by multiple instances. • The second challenge is to enable the use and publication of standards involving multiple standard development organisations (SDO). This can be enabled technically through SMART standards but it requires copyright and business agreements. Evolution of Interoperability Standards – Joint INT:NET – AIOTI – STANDICT report (Draft version) 20 A Conclusion: Towards a New Ecosystem of Standardisation Practice SDOs must engage in a standardisation practice to enable standard, concept and architecture and systems interoperability. We have listed the following challenges: • Adapt the standardization ecosystem practice to build, publish and maintain information models, which breaks silos, improve consistency and facilitates the life of users. • Establishment of standard construction that enables the use of cross-cutting standards in vertical domains. • Align the work on concept standards to ensure interoperability of concepts. • Align the work on architecture standards to ensure interoperability of architectures. • Ensure assurance and conformity assessment, when interoperability profile standards can involve elements defined by multiple instances. • Enable the use and publication of standards involving multiple SDOs IEC SMB/SG12 has published a document15 which points out the “absence of a standardized method for transposing information into digital artifacts”. It uses the term semantic domains which we can associate here with information models and lists the following needs • Assessment on when an information model has to be created. • Agility and time-to-market. • Tooling. • Favouring re-use across multiple SDOs. • Information model governance • Distribution and translation Appropriately addressing these needs will enable (1) the advent of digital twin applications, and (2) the agility needed for the metaverse. 15 July 2024. https://iec.ch/basecamp/semantic-interoperability-what-it-why-it-important-and-what-needs-be-done-standardization