Mobile Devices in the Workplace

Strayer University
CIS333
Professor Roden
January 22, 2015

Mobile Devices in the Workplace
Introduction
Mobile devices in the workplace can offer many advantages; however, there are a few major concerns when allowing mobile devices in the workplace. Security being the largest concern, followed by physical concerns and the cost of Information Technology (IT) professionals.
Security
Security is one of the most important aspects to many businesses. Allowing employees to have mobile devices in work areas may compromise the security of networks. If an employee was to plug their phone into a compute to charge and the phone had a virus on it that virus could be inherited by the work station. Take Bradly Manning for instance, he was privileged to access classified information not to insert a CD-R and steal classified documents. If a user means harm, allowing mobile devices in the workplace only acts as an aide to them. Had Manning not been permitted mobile media in a classified area it would have been significantly more difficult to steal the documents.
Physical Concerns
The physical concerns with allowing mobile devices in the workplace include distractions from work and possible health hazards. A distracted worker is not only less productive but also careless. Imagine a fork lift driver trying to read a text message and driving through a warehouse where there are other workers; the driver would obviously not be devoted to safety. It is illegal in most states to text and drive for this very reason; distractions are never a god thing when trying to focus. An employee playing games and talking on their mobile device is significantly less productive that one dedicated on the task at hand. All electronic devices are prohibited in many factories such as those with a significant amount of dust. Grain milling produces dust in the air and single spark could cause the dried grain dust to ignite resulting in a massive fire.
Costs of Information Technology (IT)
The cost of the IT team goes up when allowing mobile devices in the workplace. For example, if a graphics design company issues their employees a PC with Windows 8 Professional on it but the employee prefers his/her personal MacBook Pro. If the employee uses their MacBook to work on projects and one day that MacBook crashes, the IT team would need to be well proficient in both Windows and iOS. The more certifications IT professionals have, the more they are paid, typically. If an employee were to bring their laptop they normally use at work home with them to get ahead or catch up on a project and connect it to their home network, they could unknowingly have contracted a virus from their home network. Their home network may not be properly secure and upon reconnection to the network at the office they could then contaminated a normally secure network.
Good Idea or Not
Personally, I believe that allowing mobile devices in the workplace is a great idea. That being said, I also feel that those devices should never be connected to the network where proprietary information is stored. Mobile devices should never be connected to any workstation which is on that network either. There is a simple and relatively inexpensive fix to this issue: have one network for company owned equipment, all hard wired, and one network which is wireless only used for mobile devices. I think that with strict policies and guidelines allowing mobile devices in the workplace would be great for morale. After all, a happy employee is a productive hardworking employee.
Android
According to Stuart Dredge with theguardian.com (2014), “This openness is a boon for the tech-savvy Android user, because pretty much anything on their device that they don’t like can be swapped out for something better. They also tend to be pretty good at not installing apps that might play fast and loose with personal data. For them, Android doesn’t have a security problem.” It is no doubt that Android is one of the most popular Operating Systems (OS) for mobile devices, it is open source meaning that it is free and users are allowed to change it to make the OS their own. Applications are much easier to design than other Oss like Apple’s iOS. Apple’s iOS is not an open source OS meaning that users must pay for it and there is an intensive vetting process prior to the release of any applications. The annual security report released earlier this year by Cisco (2014) “claimed in January that 99% of all malware in 2013 targeted Android devices, while security firm Kaspersky Lab suggested a similar figure of 98% in December last year.” Kaspersky Lab, an endpoint security firm based in the United Kingdom, has stated that Android is so heavily targeted because it is a widely used OS that is easily targeted by malware authors. (Funk, 2013)

References:
Cisco. (2014) 2014 Annual Security Report. Retrieved October 26, 2014, from https://www.cisco.com/web/offer/gist_ty2_asset/Cisco_2014_ASR.pdf
Dredge, S. (2014, Feb) How can I keep my Android tablet or smartphone secure? Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/feb/12/android-smartphone-tablet- malware-viruses
Funk, C. (2013, Dec) Kaspersky Lab detects 315,000 new malicious files every day Retrieved from http://www.kaspersky.co.uk/about/news/virus/2013/Kaspersky_Lab_detects _315000_new_malicious_files_every_day_