The Consumerization Of IT
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| (Processor.com - Apr 09, 2010)
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What Does The Influx Of Consumer Devices Mean For Your Enterprise?
Key Points - Security becomes more complex as more devices are allowed to access the network, requiring additional diligence from data center managers.
- Increased dependence on the enterprise network from remote workers makes 24/7 availability more critical than ever.
- Speed and security can be enhanced by using browser-based applications that can operate safely in front of the corporate firewall.
The advent of smartphone use is just the latest extension of the corporate network outside the traditional office setting, extending a company's systems and applications to employees anywhere in the world.
"The enterprise network ends with the user," says Ashish Kuriakose, marketing communications manager for ManageEngine (www.manageengine.com). Joel Bomgar, founder and CEO of Bomgar (www.bomgar.com), agrees. "Fifteen years ago, it was point-to-point technology as people would connect from their laptops or home computers into the office," he says. "That's no longer the case. Now it is all spread out. It is like an octopus. So the scope of the responsibility for the corporate network has changed."
Now, the typical enterprise network extends to a variety of devices that use a variety of form factors and operating systems, meaning management challenges for enterprises and data center professionals.
Therefore, data center professionals need to be knowledgeable about the different remote technologies and how they impact the enterprise network, experts agree. The challenges will continue to grow as more workers do their jobs remotely; the number of mobile workers worldwide is expected to reach nearly 1.2 billion by year's end, according to a report from IDC.
"The goal is to make the data center invisible to those on the front line," Bomgar says. "You need to make the data center technology-agnostic so that it doesn't matter if people are connecting to it from inside or outside of the office."
Security Is The Top Concern
Experts cite security as one of the biggest issues when it comes to the extension of the network outside of the enterprise walls.
"Risks have increased greatly," says Frank Kenney, vice president of global strategy at Ipswitch (www.ipswitch.com). He recommends that firms establish and enforce policies about the use of remote devices. "You have to look at the available technology and the way that people move around information," he says.
However, the need to limit the devices used to access the network has to be balanced with the enterprise's corporate needs. If workers and managers need to access the network in order to perform their jobs, they will find a way to do it, even if it threatens network security. "They will take the measures they need to in order to be productive," Kenney says.
Some enterprises have left it up to employees to buy their own remote devices. One way to better manage these devices is for the enterprise to supply them for users, recommends David Schofield, director of wireless mobility for Thompson Advisory Group (www.i-tag.net). "You have to weigh the cost against the cost of bringing down the entire network," he says.
It's not just the outside salespeople or remote managers who are buying their own smartphones or laptops, either. Often it's the CEO or other top executives, who will demand that they be able to access the corporate network via their new iPhones or other devices. Although data professionals in the past could argue that the network didn't support the device and it was too expensive to do so, they no longer win those arguments, according to James Bond, vice president of software and product development for Apptix (www.apptix.com).
One way of giving unsupported devices immediate access to the network, according to Bond, is to provide access to "guest" servers that are separate from the data center's most sensitive systems. Once the data center adds support for the new technology or device, the user can access the enterprise network, not just the "guest" server.
The more users who access data, the more chance there is of it being compromised, adds Bond, pointing to the thefts and losses of laptops and other remote devices containing corporate data. So, he recommends encrypting information at rest and in transmission so that it is unusable if the remote device falls into the wrong hands or if a transmission is intercepted. However, he cautions that some low-level encryption applications offering automatic decryption defeat the purpose of the security precaution.
High Availability Is More CriticalThan Ever
Today's professionals require constant access to their networked data. "It used to be the network was available only from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Today, it has to be available all of the time," says Julie Palen, senior vice president of mobile device management for Tangoe (www.tangoe.com). "This means the servers and the data center have to have greater throughput. People's expectations have greatly changed in terms of availability."
As such, maintenance should be performed in the wee hours of the night, with a minimum of systems taken offline at any one time, Palen says. If network users need to be moved from server to server, Palen recommends they be moved one at a time rather than en masse in order to have the least amount of impact on users.
Schofield adds that the additional throughput expected by users means that data center admins will be working with a greater number of more powerful devices to provide the needed access. Therefore, they need to educate themselves on the different hardware and software the enterprise is using or is planning to use to ensure they can manage a variety of devices. "Once the enterprise decides to go mobile, it expands pretty fast," Schofield says.
The mobile applications have to be able to run on a variety of devices with a variety of screen sizes, so data center managers will need to ensure that the necessary interfaces are in place for the applications to run on a small screen as they do on a PC, says David Uhler, national director for research and development for Slalom Consulting.
Sometimes remote users don't have the time to enter PINs and passwords and wait for all security checks to run, Uhler says. He recommends that data center managers enable applications to operate on the Web in front of the corporate firewall.
Additionally, with network access now critical for workers at any time and at any place, it's essential that IT admins employ monitoring tools that automatically alert them to network hardware or software that isn't working properly, Kuriakose says.
Kuriakose also recommends re-examining service-level agreements with hardware, software, and Internet service providers to ensure that vendors are meeting the needs and expectations of the globally connected enterprise. |
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