Mobile Security for Employees’ Personal Devices (BYOD)

The BYOD (bring your own device) strategy has major security concerns. It’s actually the second biggest IT challenge according to 70% of IT decision makers. (BAE systems)

When you rely on employees to bring their own devices, you also open your company to a new source of entry – mobile security threats.

The obvious benefits of providing work-only devices includes high security settings and software. That is not the case for a BYOD strategy.

Understanding mobile security threats:

Kaspersky:

In 2014, Kaspersky detected almost 3.5 million pieces of malware on more than 1 million user devices. By 2017, Kaspersky’s in-lab detection technologies processing reached 360,000 malicious files per day. And 78% of those files were malware programs, meaning that over 280,000 malware files per day were detected—many of which target mobile devices.

Harvard Business Review:

According to a 2016 report on mobile security, the cost of mobile app hacks and breaches will reach $1.5 billion by 2021. Yet mobile device security often gets less attention than security for network systems or even our laptop computers. The same report says $34 million is spent annually on mobile app development while only $2 million is spent on app security.

Now that you know (a tiny bit about) the "why," let’s focus on how to close this cyber security gap for your employees’ devices through mobile threat defense.

This is where effective training and solid policies come into play. We suggest implementing a few tips to help you navigate this area of concern, in order of importance:

1. Offer security protection for their device while they’re employed. This is a huge win-win solution. If your budget is tight, you can ask them to join in on the cost – though we would shy away from that.
2. Password updates every 3 months. You must request that employees refresh their company master password (assuming they have a password manager). This is effective for many secondary reasons as well.  
3. Immediate notification of lost or stolen devices (phone, computers, etc.). You must have a policy that employees notify you when something occurs with their device. Whether it’s lost, stolen, or misplaced. This also applies to sending phones for “repairs.”
4. The balance between security concerns and the fact that this is the employee’s device, not yours. Ah, this is hard! Technically speaking, you’re only going to be as successful here as your employees allow. Good relationships come into play here. And the best way to lead is by example.

As mentioned above, the MOST important tool you can use is software. 

You must understand that the consequences of a mobile breach are far-reaching and more costly than any software you offer invest in. 

Your ROI (return on investment) is much higher than you can fathom, because your perceived risk is much lower than reality.

So, if you’re an existing customer – we’d be happy to add this to your toolkit.

And if you aren’t, feel free to reach out and we’d be happy to help you get started!