The End Of BYOD As We Know It? - InformationWeek

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Comments
The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
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kennabell
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kennabell,
 User Rank: Apprentice
4/12/2013 | 3:59:23 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
I believe that your statement that enterprise can't 'deliver on truly secure BYOD implementations, the chief problem being users that simply refuse to follow the policies that businesses have set up' cuts to the core issue, but I think a growing trend shows a way forward. I am seeing more companies are writing thier own data security apps that use API's like Tigertext's SOX/HIPAA compliant texting TigerConnect API, or the Dropbox API, that run on multiple device and OSes and help the users 'automatically' follow various BYOD policy requirements. I think you will see more companies using this stratagy to deal with BYOD.
SeanDo40
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SeanDo40,
 User Rank: Apprentice
3/22/2013 | 4:07:25 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
R.I.P for BYOD?

Has it ever really been about the device? To MidnightGÇÖs point about the Commodore 64 and the suitcase styled GÇ£portableGÇ¥ computers that I used to lug up 3 flights of stairs to get into my apartment, itGÇÖs about me the consumer, the user, the worker wanting to be more productive and getting the tools I need to make this happen. Yes, we fly in the face of corporate IT because at times they act a department of GÇ£NoGÇ¥. No, you cant have that, no you cant use that, no no no. But what I want is GÇ£YesGÇ¥. Yes, choose your device, choose your location, choose your own workstyling, as long as we in IT can maintain our security and compliance.

Corporate IT needs to look at the full landscape of tools out there to support GÇ£meGÇ¥ the consumer worker (maybe we should call it the GÇ£worksumerGÇ¥). Of course everyone is looking at MDM, MAM, MIM, EMM solutions and all that clutter makes me as an IT guy want to shout MOM! But it isnGÇÖt about managing the device. It's about the user and what they need to do on their devices to be productive. DonGÇÖt forget it is and always has been the worksumer (I like it) who is driving this. An attitude of "bring your own means youGÇÖre on your own" wont fly, at least not for long.

Yes, the cloud is where to look, but as you said the disparate clouds will cause worksumers (yup, I am trademarking this) to choose their cloud. I am now a Microsoft fan boy with my Lumia 920, my Surface (yes, IGÇÖm the guy that bought one) and my Skydrive, XBOX music, etc. But my work cloud should reside next to my consumer cloud. I canGÇÖt store work data in my Skydrive and let Sally Sultress store her work data on GoogleGÇÖs cloud. For that IT needs to embrace a private cloud and use services that give me the public cloud benefits with private cloud security, like Hyperdrive to cross worksumer devices.

But, you know what keeps me up at night? The data, on the worksumer device going rogue. They quit. They get fired. They leave their device, the one they chose, on the bus. What now? Again I want to shout MOM.

Thanks,
/SeanD+¦
David Berlind
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David Berlind,
 User Rank: Apprentice
3/22/2013 | 11:56:09 AM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
These are good points Andrew. However, our (Fritz's and mine) walled-garden hypothesis is less about the document formats (the traditional lock-in points) and more about how the stack in the cloud loses its value as you attempt to mix and match. The Google example is a good one. Google+ is in the DNA of so many of Google's services (and finding its way into Android apps) and, depending on your POV, enhances them. As I mentioned in the story (for example), Google+ adds a measure of configurability to Google Voice (with a bit of Google Contacts tossed into the mix). From within Gmail (mobile or Web), you can add people to Google+ and assign them to specific circles. Google is using the power of it's various cloud based services to drive up the value of the personal device (the real PDA) while driving out friction in usability.

Consider the hypothetical scenario where you're walking down a street and your phone tells you that the soles on your running shoes on your feet have just exceeded their usefulness and that the replacement is available at a merchant that's 50 yards away for a special one time discount (just for you). In the notification, there's a "Buy" button. You click "Buy," it engages the phone's wallet app, closes the transaction, the maps spring to life and navigate you to the merchant. As you pass through the door, a QR code pops up on your phone -- one that the clerk can scan to authenticate that the bag that's already sitting on the counter with your name on it is yours. You pick up your bag and walk out.

This level of convenience (which I like) --- perhaps we call it real personal digital assistance (as opposed to the PDAs of old --- gets better as you contribute more information to your personal cloud. Google for example can cross-tab a lot of signals (your location, your search habits, your email, you purchasing patterns, your music, etc) to improve an Android phone's ability to anticipate and assist you with your next move. Apple, Microsoft, etc will all have to go there. The power to make this happen will come from the cloud and the power to anticipate will lose fidelity the minute you start mixing and matching.

A more rudimentary form of the lock-in is your music and entertainment. At this point, all the players have something like iTunes. It's so terribly inconvenient though to attempt to mix and match, even though the file format (MP3) is the same. It comes down to which cloud you want as the power behind your entertainment. That in turn essentially controls device selection (for some of us).
Andrew Binstock
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Andrew Binstock,
 User Rank: Author
3/22/2013 | 6:15:58 AM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
Branching off from your main point:

"Each will be walled-in by the somewhat proprietary alignment that exists between the mobile OSes and their respective clouds. Enclosed in those walls, businesses will likely find services worth subscribing to (e.g., Google Apps For Business). But those services will be so strikingly different from one cloud to the next (not to mention how they're integrated with other services in the same cloud) that those same businesses may have no choice but to dissuade BYODers from bringing "non-aligned" devices to the network."

Interestingly, the walled garden is less of an obstacle for documents due to the standardization of formats. But other data, for example blogs and wikis, which do not have industry standards represent a real problem when it comes to migration.

If the walled garden approach becomes further entrenched, I fear that even document standards will begin to fray ("Want to save it as Word or ODT? Fine, but you'll lose formatting and possibly some content...") and it will be impossible to migrate anything you can't screen-scrape from one cloud to the next.
David Berlind
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David Berlind,
 User Rank: Apprentice
3/21/2013 | 11:34:43 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
That's a very fair point moarsauce123 -- that monocultures are potentially more vulnerable. It's sort of a pay me now or pay later scenario, isn't it. You can pay now to support something more heterogeneous (requires more resources). Or you can risk paying later (in the way of recovering from a single attack that compromised everything).
moarsauce123
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moarsauce123,
 User Rank: Ninja
3/21/2013 | 10:55:59 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
I'm not sure if relying entirely on Google is that much better securitywise. Now there is only one point to attack and if that is successful ten thousands systems are compromised. That strikes me as more rewarding and with a much greater impact than having to attack each single system. The key to more security is more diversity and that is not found on a Google, Microsoft, or Apple monoculture.
David Berlind
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David Berlind,
 User Rank: Apprentice
3/21/2013 | 9:05:42 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
GAProgrammer - you make very good points. However, I think there is one counterveiling force and that is that employees are more willing to pay to have their own devices than they were before.. and pay for their own contracts with the carriers. I've been party to this debate which goes something like this:

in favor: it's customary to cover the cost if the mobile device is being used for business reasons
against: true, but let's be honest,.. if we don't cover the cost, the employees are going to get devices/contracts of their own anyway

the same argument is used in the discussion about covering the cost of home internet access (though not wherever Marissa Meyer is the boss)

So, the quid pro quo is that the company gets the hardware and services off the books. It could be a short sited view. The support costs could easily outweigh the savings on hardware and contracts. But it's hard for companies to take the long view.. especially when executives are pushing for BYOD for themselves.
GAProgrammer
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GAProgrammer,
 User Rank: Ninja
3/21/2013 | 8:57:11 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
Honestly, anyone with the slightest bit of foresight could have seen this coming - especially since a lot of IT people are anti-Apple. I have said from the beginning that we don't HAVE to support it, no matter what the tech journalists say. All I have to do is explain how much it will cost over the next 5 years and the executives agree - there is not a NEED for any BYOD in any business unless you are a small company and want to make your new employees pay for your tech. If they want the gadgets, they can use the approved ones, or none at all. I think that it is part of IT's job to make sure we don't fall prey to every whim of the tech press and trends - our job is to use tech responsibly for the betterment of our company. Our job is not to pander to whiny kids who want to use their iDevice to access (and later possible lose) corporate data.
David Berlind
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David Berlind,
 User Rank: Apprentice
3/21/2013 | 8:15:19 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
Spot on Midnight. That's why I said below that "It's practically a time honored tradition in IT circles." This cycle repeats itself over and over. First it was PCs. Then it was LANs (Department A had Novell, Department B had Banyan, Department C had LAN Manager, and so on). Now it's smartphones. Clouds too. How many users of Dropbox vs. Box.Net vs. XYZ do there have to be before someone puts their foot down?
David Berlind
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David Berlind,
 User Rank: Apprentice
3/21/2013 | 8:11:09 PM
re: The End Of BYOD As We Know It?
LOL Bryan. Don't hold your breath!
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