In the first two parts of this blog series, I talked about Microsoft’s new Display Dock and the Continuum feature of Windows 10 Mobile and how technology like it is going to significantly change how people work. In this third part, I am going to focus on what businesses need to do to ensure mobile security for all the devices that are changing the way we work.
Acronyms, who needs them?
While mobile devices have traditionally been used for business email, they are increasingly used for so much more. Smartphone ownership is still growing in Canada, 13% alone between 2014 and 2015, and nearly all these devices are being used at work.
While I’m sure many of you have heard of the term BYOD (bring your own device), and may also be familiar with some of the others like CYOD (choose your own device) and COPE (corporate owned, personally enabled), at the end of the day none of those acronyms matter. With these devices doing more and more in the workplace, the key is building an IT infrastructure for mobile security, whether it is personally or corporately owned.
In 2014, 16 millions mobile devices were likely hit with malware globally, and hackers and cyber criminals are increasing seeing mobile devices as the easiest way in to your corporate network. Also, since users are always going to use their mobile devices for both personal and business use, any corporate data on the devices must be secured and separated from that personal data.
Secure Access from Anywhere
Most of our customers use secure VPN access that Lanworks has implemented for their worker’s notebooks. However, with the explosion in the use of mobile devices to do more than just checking corporate email, there is a huge amount of company data residing on them and flowing to and from them from behind your Firewall and from Cloud applications. This data needs securing, and there are a number of solutions that we’ve implemented for our customers that can help achieve this.
One of the solutions we recommend is the Pulse Secure Pulse Client. Pulse Secure is a new company born when Juniper Networks decided to spin off its VPN business. So while the name is new, the Pulse Client, previous known as Junos Pulse, has been around for quite some time, and 80% of the Fortune 50 use Pulse Secure’s solutions.
The Pulse Secure client is currently available for Android and iOS and is an integrated FIPS 140-2 compliant client the offers VPN, NAC and anti-malware in an all-in-one application. It integrates with Pulse Secure’s VPN Gateway hardware and can be managed by 3rd-party enterprise mobile management tools. Since this whole series started off talking about a feature coming to Windows 10 Mobile, I’ll say that right now the Pulse Secure client doesn’t support the latest version of this mobile OS, but once it actually ships later this year, I’m sure support will come soon after.
Separating Work from Play
It’s a given that your employees are going to use their mobile device for work and play, whether or not it is personally owned or company owned. This can lead to a lot of problems with company data not be stored securely, and also with it being accessible to personal applications on the phone. Another issue, especially if the device is personally owned, but being used for work, is that if there is a need to remove company data from the phone or tablet you don’t want this process also to affect personal data. Wiping the entire device isn’t going to be an option when it’s their personal phone.
Although there are many solutions on the market to achieve this separation of work from play on a mobile device, I’m going to highlight another solution from Pulse Secure. Pulse Secure Workspace is an iOS and Android application that separates all corporate data into an encrypted secure container of the device that connects back to your business through VPN, while leaving all the personal information on the phone to work, connect as normal and also remain private.
The beauty of a containerized solution is that all the work data within in it can’t interact with the personal side of the phone, so, for example, an employee can’t take a sensitive work document and send it to someone using their Gmail account.
Again, like the Pulse Client, Windows 10 Mobile isn’t supported yet, but we expect to come soon after this OS launches.
Out with the Old, in with the New Way
As I said when I started this series, mobile devices are completely changing how we work, and we no longer need to be chained to a desk, or even a notebook to be productive. However, with these changes come many more challenges as to how to make sure that the devices by our mobile workforce secured from threats, able to connect safely to your network and that corporate data is not compromised by personal use.
I hope in this last part I’ve given you a high-level understanding of some solutions Lanworks offers that can help you achieve these security goals. We have a dedicated team with many years of experience implementing these technologies, and we look forward to hearing from you so we can talk more about what we can do for you.
