40% of companies have already implemented BYOD solutions

The world is increasingly mobile, as figures indicate: in 2018, there will be 12.100 million mobile devices in use, half of the world’s workers will require BYOD solutions in 2017 and 67% of managers and IT professionals are convinced that mobility will impact their organizations in an equal or greater way than had the emergence of the Internet in the early nineties.

BYOD, increasingly implemented in businesses

According to a report by the firm Information Security, 40% of organizations have provided all employees BYOD solutions. However, 13% of companies have no plans to adopt them in the short or medium term; 3% have tried, but eventually discarded them; and 9% do not offer them yet, although they will do it in the next twelve months.

Companies that do not have yet BYOD policies need a little push through, for example, the implementation of security technologies and training for workers in terms of the different variants of security threats on mobile devices, scenarios to avoid and BYOD best practices.

Regarding the implementation of BYOD policies, the IT department is responsible for most organizations (69%), followed by security team (55%) and compliance (24%).

BYOD and security, two inseparable concepts

As mobility and BYOD solutions increase its presence in businesses, so do the threats to security and privacy. The latest report by Information Security, called “BYOD & Mobile Security”, done as a result of more than 800 surveys to cyber security professionals, delves into these security challenges by analyzing the current situation while offering new ideas for effective action against mobile threats.

This report reaches the following conclusions:

1. The main drivers for the implementation of BYOD strategies include increased mobility of employees (63%), greatest satisfaction (56%) and increased productivity (55%), while reducing costs is considered the most important factor for only 47% of respondents.
2. On the contrary, the biggest barriers to the adoption of BYOD solutions for companies are security risks (39%) and privacy (12%). At the opposite extreme, management opposition (3%) and concerns about user experience (4%).
3. 20% of companies have suffered some mobile security breach mainly due to malware and malicious WiFi connectivity.
4. BYOD security threats pose a heavy cost to the IT resources of organizations (35%) and an increased support work (27%).
5. Although mobile security threats are increasing, only 30% of companies have increased their investment in BYOD security for next year, while 37% plan changes in their budget line.

Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies: use cases

45% of employees use their BYOD devices for editing documents; 43% to access the company Intranet; and 35% for video conferencing. Other uses allowed by the organizations in their BYOD policies are sharing documents, access to SaaS (Software as a Service) applications, internally developed mobile apps, virtual desktops, backup or cloud storage, among others.

Allowed mobile applications

Email, calendar and contact management are still the most popular types of mobile applications allowed in BYOD solutions (84%). Applications designed to boost productivity are also those that may increase the risk of information leaks, intrusions or malware. Therefore, finding the balance between productivity and security will continue to be key to the success of BYOD in the workplace.

Managing security on mobile devices

43% of companies use mobile device management tools to manage mobile devices, followed by endpoint security tools (28%) and network access control (27%).

The report highlights how important it is for organizations to protect their data after they are downloaded to the end user’s device. It is also essential to implement a specific strategy for data security that safeguards data across all devices on any network.

BYOD, also outside the company

In addition to employees (76%), some organizations make BYOD solutions available to providers (23%), partners (16%) and customers (14%). In this sense, we need to consider that if BYOD is made available externally, companies must increase their security in order to protect sensitive company data and systems.