Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) - The next frontier for IT departments

I was sitting at the management team meeting of a Top 5 technology company recently and we conducted a straw pole around the desk. Laptop or Tablet? The room was split but fell in favour of the laptop, and a vociferous debate ensued. Whether those present or not like it or not, Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) is here to stay.

The challenge for corporates is that individuals can afford to upgrade their devices quicker than their employer can. An Ovum report (‘The BYOD Gap’) noted that this consumerisation is taking the control of IT departments out of their hands, and into the hands of the employer. How does business manage this? Well manage is a choice word to use because I’m unsure if they do. From conversation I have had businesses take an approach akin to the Little Dutch Boy by implementing a stop gap and hoping Mobile Device Management (MDM) does the trick.

Apple and Android have stolen the march on the BYOD trend but the advent of the Windows Phone (fuelled by Nokia’s alliance with Microsoft) will only add to the headache that is presented to IT departments across the globe, but what these players have done is boost the MDM marketplace. While these devices might not comply with a wide range of security standards, it is widely accepted that within five years this landscape will change and compliance will be more widespread.

With Gartner estimating global smartphone sales to top 450 million in 2011, climbing to over 645 million in 2012, it suggests that in 2011 smartphone and tablet sales will be almost 45 per cent higher than PC’s. It seems as though my round table straw pole was, like it or lump it, a sign of the time right now. I will be conducting it again in a years time.

All of this is of course impossible if you don’t have the right people or partners in place to support your business. ARM works with both global Security Consultanices, and SME partners providing professionals with PCI, GRC, ISO, CHECK, CREST, Network & Perimeter Security, DLP, IAM and SIEM skills. As an accredited Investor in People employer we understand the importance of continually improving our employee’s skill sets. IT & Information Security continues to progress at some pace and accordingly investing in your security team is one of the most prudent investments you can make.

While we have been gripped by the credit crunch for the past 2 years IT Security Gartner has noted that in 2010 security software and services spending bucked the trend, outstripping all other areas of infrastructure and software, posting a 4% growth. Consider this against shrinking IT budgets and the focus on SIEM, email security, content filtering and user provisioning spending makes it all the more impressive.

What this pressure of IT department’s does is place a premium on getting the right people to make good the investment in security. Demand for security professional with the right badges continues to grow across all sectors including government, SMEs and Enterprise. This has continued the upward spiral experienced during the 2009 recession.

CWJobs conducted a survey earlier this year which discovered eight of ten IT professionals believe technologies such as mobile and cloud computing are creating this demand. The same number of professionals are going to capitalise on this demand by training themselves up on security capabilities to boost their skillset – 19% plan to re-train from scratch and enter this lucrative and challenging market.

So, the question that presents itself to business – what does the security threat landscape look like to you, what are you going to do about it, and who are you going to get to do it?

Damian Hicklin

IT Security & Communications Recruitment Manager

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ARM

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