Personal Privacy Is a Top BYOD Fear

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IT departments are concerned about the privacy of their personal information if mobile device management (MDM) software were installed on smartphones or tablets they brought from home to use at work, according to the results of a survey of 335 IT professionals sponsored by MokaFive and conducted through an independent survey firm. The findings highlight the growing concern over bring your own device (BYOD) initiatives

Survey results also indicated businesses are unprepared for dealing with the growing BYOD trend. Despite the fact that most survey respondents were IT personnel, about one third reported having no BYOD policies in place, and 10 percent admitted to not knowing whether their companies even had BYOD policies. However, nearly nine in 10 (88 percent) of respondents said their companies had some form of BYOD, whether sanctioned or not.

Furthermore, IT professionals said current platforms to secure personal mobile devices, such as mobile device management (MDM) technologies, are too intrusive. Implementation of MDM software brought about a widely negative response from those surveyed, with 77 percent saying MDM software was unacceptable, unpalatable or left them feeling violated.

Just 17.8 percent reported having full-disk encryption of personal devices, while 28.3 percent reported implementing two-factor authentication policies. The vast majority (63 percent) reported using a virtual private network (VPN) to secure personal mobile devices in the workplace. Nearly a third (31.8 percent) said they didn’t have a policy concerning data ownership on personal devices, though 57.1 percent said they did have a policy in place, while 11.1 percent didn’t know

To read the original eWeek article, click here: Privacy Breaches Top List of BYOD Concerns: Report

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