How to Manage Mobile Devices in the Company?

Lost or stolen mobile devices are a modern nightmare for companies as each device can contain gigabytes of confidential business data.

Smartphones and tablets are particularly problematic – according to some estimates from the USA, up to 5% of all smartphones are lost or stolen each year. Not even a tenth of the number of lost or stolen mobile phones is returned to their owners, especially if the devices went missing while traveling or outside the workplace. Of this, nearly two-thirds are official mobile phones, while the remaining third consists of smartphones personally owned by employees that are used for work.

The latter category is on the rise due to the BYOD (bring your own device) trend, which reflects companies’ increasing reliance on personal devices that employees want to use for both private and work purposes. The BYOD concept attempts to reconcile the user’s desire to use the latest smartphones and tablets that they are already purchasing privately, with the company’s recognition that it cannot justify the typically large and frequent expenses of constantly acquiring new devices.

Security First

Although this represents a significant financial loss, it could almost be said that this financial loss is a secondary problem. According to estimates from security company McAfee and the Ponemon Institute, over half of lost smartphones did not have even the most basic built-in security measures activated, such as pattern or PIN lock on the main screen of the smartphones.

Corporate IT and management can breathe a sigh of relief if a smartphone or tablet ends up in the hands of an ordinary thief who sees it only as merchandise for resale. Otherwise, any unprotected mobile device provides easy access to sensitive and confidential business data that can cause significant and various damages. For example, if the mobile device belongs to a company in the financial or medical industry, the impact of information leakage is twofold. In addition to the immediate damage to the bank’s client or the patient, the bank or insurance company, or the medical institution itself is exposed to significant penalties due to the potential misuse of data.

Therefore, managing mobile devices, or the set of tools and policies collectively known as mobile device management, is an indispensable part of the company’s security policy.

Granular Control

This need is well recognized, and various manufacturers offer a plethora of solutions for managing mobile devices to interested companies. Whether it is comprehensive solutions that offer complete encryption of business data or smaller, more flexible solutions, they all utilize some common concepts. However, each of them establishes a clear division between the user’s private and business data. Thus, the company’s security policy can, in the event of theft or loss of smartphones, initiate the removal of only business data or, in agreement with the user, completely erase the content of the device.

One option is to prevent accidental or intentional leakage of business information from the company. It is possible, while the smartphone or tablet is connected to the corporate WLAN or VPN network, to prevent posting on social networks or to disable the camera. Similarly, it is possible to prohibit copying documents to public file-sharing services like Dropbox while the device is connected to a public WLAN hotspot. All of the above can be combined with the device’s GPS receiver, which opens the possibility of automatically applying defined security policies depending on the device’s location.

Own or in the Cloud?

It is clear that such a wide range of mobile device management options will interest not only large but also smaller companies. The latter do not necessarily need to have their own IT or infrastructure for managing mobile devices – a logical solution is to seek some variant of a cloud service that the company rents with clearly defined monthly or annual costs. Whether it is independent companies or telecoms, which are the most natural providers of such services, mobile device management is available to all who recognize it as a need.

Mobile device management is one of the topics of the 7th Combis Business Technology Conference, which will be held at the end of September in Šibenik, and whose media sponsor is Lider.