How the cloud and mobile device effect IT management
More and more businesses are launching mobility strategies every day, and some reports indicate that this trend will only intensify, as the consumerization of IT continues to heat up. Bring your own device (BYOD) has been among the most popular styles of enterprise mobility, largely because of the rapidly rising adoption rates of smartphones and tablets by employees.
However, information governance and data security become far more complex in BYOD environments, as employee-owned devices used to access corporate infrastructure pose a legitimate threat. Businesses need to take a proactive approach to BYOD or destine themselves for potentially devastating consequences, such as data breaches and misuse of corporate IT.
Where CIO’s fear to tread
Help Net Security recently reported that while security and monitoring can be extremely difficult for employee-owned mobile devices, the real task is protecting networks and data in a comprehensive fashion. This means following encryption best practices, using the most advanced security software and implementing monitoring tools to ensure the integrity of infrastructure and information.
The source explained that many companies are beginning to use cloud computing-based storage solutions, as well as Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) for document sharing and email, and that this is especially popular in BYOD environments. As the benefits of BYOD include on-demand corporate IT access for employees, the cloud caters to the needs of mobile workers.
While cloud computing has traditionally had a stigma related to security, these fears are exacerbated when personal mobile devices are accessing corporate information from a variety of places, many of which are hard to monitor.
“BYOD is not the problem, cloud storage is. It is now very simple for employees to store documents, for free, using any number of file storage providers such as Dropbox or Google drive,” Simon Bain, Simplexico’s CTO, told Help Net Security. “There is also an increasing number of applications that can be downloaded that help with office work. Where data is stored and how securely within these applications is often a mystery. In either case, once out of the enterprise IT environment it becomes impossible for CIOs to know where company data is, or who has access to it.”
According to the news provider, companies cannot avoid these trends, as BYOD and cloud storage represent massive opportunities to boost productivity and decrease operational expenditures.
Proven managed services work best;
As most companies take the third-party service provider approach to cloud computing, executives should always focus on creating the most beneficial and secure service level agreements with their vendors. Managed services can be the perfect complement to a corporate IT strategy, especially in BYOD environments when cloud becomes more necessary.
By choosing a proven provider of document management services, cloud computing solutions and overall data security, companies can streamline the information governance process and reap the benefits of BYOD.
Source:
https://www.net-security.org/secworld.php?id=14388&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter”