Today, businesses rely on mobility as a way for their dispersed and remote workforces to stay productive, connected, and properly managed. The global BYOD (bring your own device) and enterprise mobility market size is expected to grow by $862,29 million by 2024, according to a Technavio report. As enterprise mobility continues to increase and more devices are deployed, companies must look to the future to explore ways to become more adaptable and scalable. 5G connectivity will have a huge impact on enterprise mobility and will bring significant benefits to remote workers. Let's explore what's to come and how these solutions should be used to take business operations to the next level. About the Author Joe Fizor is Lead Solutions Engineer at TBI
Mobile Device Management (MDM)
As businesses increase the number of mobile devices in use, mobile device management (MDM) becomes more critical. Managing these devices and the need for proper accessibility and security is a large and time-consuming task for businesses. It is important to have constant visibility and effective threat detection. MDM solutions allow you to implement security on all devices on the corporate network. Appropriate protocols can then be established to take appropriate action if security incidents or potential threats are identified.
Employees now using personal devices or untrusted devices to connect to business-critical information create multiple, easily accessible entry points for attackers. There has been an increase in breaches caused by the theft or attack of unlocked smartphones using unsecured third-party applications; The recent Twitter data breach is an example of an attack involving compromised mobile phone data. A remote workforce is an easy target for many threat actors; Organizations should prioritize security awareness training to increase their knowledge against phishing and fraudulent email campaigns.
MDM not only allows the business to deliver apps to employees to ensure they have the softphone, CRM, customer email address, etc., but also helps secure devices. employee mobiles. In some cases, it can even help optimize mobility service, data usage, and mobile phone plan costs. MDM can be a difficult topic for some companies with BYOD policies, but business applications can still be contained and protected through many MDM solutions. This separates personal devices, apps and information from business information and access.
Another benefit of MDM is ensuring that when a user leaves or is terminated, the device is wiped to protect company data while leaving personal data intact. This is extremely useful if the device is lost or stolen. We see many customers who have tried to implement MDM or take advantage of the basic solutions that can be offered through existing tools. Keep in mind that not all MDM solutions are created equal. As mentioned above, organizations can ensure that users have the correct (enterprise-approved) applications for their functions. The settings can also be set to deny access if the user is out of region/country or has not updated their terminal security/missing patches.
5G benefits
Like MDM, not all 5G solutions are created equal. 5G will dramatically increase performance for many users with options in the 6-60 GHz range offering much higher bandwidth and performance. But keep in mind that there are also narrowband 5G solutions for more general or IoT use, which will always show improvements over existing 4G LTE solutions. The shiny, super-fast new 5G is doing more to transform remote work. Employees can transmit large amounts of data more quickly and easily using 5G, allowing business tasks that were previously performed only onsite to be performed just as quickly offsite. This greatly improves the connection of the work-at-home (WFH) user. Productivity and efficiency can be improved by providing a dedicated connection to WFH users, avoiding general level connections and congestion from broadcast services/other users using the same connection. This allows for better resiliency in consumer-grade connections, and businesses can also avoid construction costs with implementation. 5G also helps increase the performance of AI and IoT devices, due to faster information processing and bandwidth to connect a large number of devices. But with a price. The ability of an IoT device to send sensitive information creates greater possibilities for attacks. Increased bandwidth could also lead to more devastating DDoS attacks, so making sure proper IoT security is in place is extremely important.
The future of corporate mobility
This year has seen a notable increase in business mobility that is not slowing down. Businesses will invest more in these solutions as they now rely heavily on mobility to stay efficient and productive. To make the best use of these solutions, the focus must be on managing the multitude of devices, maintaining strong device security measures and employee awareness, and incorporating the latest capabilities and solutions. Remote workers need secure connectivity and quick access to business-critical applications while businesses maintain control and visibility. Organizations should evaluate their mobility solutions to see any gaps or weaknesses and find the right solutions. They must think about how mobility will influence their future business plans, achieving the desired results without losing sight of scalability.