Mobile Readiness

Once upon a time, all an IT manager had to do was to secure an infrastructure and allied systems and tools that existed inside the “four walls” of the organization.  That is, some measure of a computer room (speaking in a virtual sense; any of these elements could stripe through multiple buildings, offices, allied agencies, etc.), fileserver(s), a wiring closet or two, a computer workstation population, and so on…

A few forward individuals, either by power, station, or adventurousness, dialed-in to the network.  Wow!  I remember jokes in the workplace:  Who the heck wants to bring the office home?

Today, we’re approaching universal connectivity.  There are so many mobile devices, and associated mobile apps – paired with new data-densities, new bandwidth and processing power considerations – that business is everywhere.

The challenge to business and IT leaders alike is not just protection to organization assets and daily production, but the challenge includes spec’ing up to accommodate present and future demands for the mobile workforce.  It also includes more than that…

It goes well beyond:  You must document allowances, as far as which classes of users have mobile access, when, and how.  And you must consider the blended environment of personal vs. business assets.  Keep in mind that folks access your organization’s central computing and data assets from personal computers, laptops, phones, tablets, etc.  The avenues for breach are many, in that you do not have an exclusive measure of control over these devices, and their associated “wellness” in terms of virus protection, malware protections, etc., etc.

Security demands are high.  You must guard against spam, spyware, malware, viruses… denial-of-service attacks, whether directed or random.  In this environment, it is prudent to consider data encryption for mobile devices.  Today, you must safeguard sensitive organization data on mobile devices:  Information is always vulnerable to theft and loss, but never more so when it’s repository is mobile and susceptible to loss itself.

More on this in the coming days…

March 10^th:  On this day in 1933, Nevada becomes the 1^st state to regulate narcotics.