When I go home after work, my wife and I are typically focused on the present moment, and especially on our young son. As new parents, we benefit from many innovative products and services—from improved car seats and creative toys to safer cribs and video baby monitors. One of the first products that we bought for our son’s nursery was a wi-fi-based baby monitor. When we brought it home and plugged it in, it connected effortlessly with our wi-fi router and smart phones. It helps provide safety and security—and perhaps most important, sleep—for the three of us.

As consumers, we just assumed that these “Wi-Fi Certified” products would be “interoperable”—that the many different devices and components in the wi-fi universe would work together seamlessly. But as a NIST employee, I realize that this interoperability doesn’t happen by magic. Underlying the millions of products that today carry the “Wi-Fi Certified” label is a complex and robust ecosystem of manufacturers, standards organizations, testing laboratories, and certification authorities.

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