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Agility is more important to businesses than ever before. Employees are scattering across the globe, using corporate and non-corporate devices to access critical data.
While agile, remote work has greatly complicated companies’ IT infrastructures, from hardware to software to cybersecurity.
Computers and mobile devices used for business now encompass multiple brands that use different operating systems and software.
OS diversity can make it difficult to manage devices equitably. Additionally, the physical distance between employees and their jobs creates logistical issues.
Of course, mobile devices that access critical business data open massive risk if lost or stolen. With more complex cyber-attacks and more opportunities to exploit mobile workers and their unprotected networks, organizations must reinforce all devices.
Mobile Device Management (MDM) seeks to remedy all these problems, allowing a company’s IT department to procure, provision, secure, and manage devices well beyond their walls. The “mobile” part of MDM is a bit of a misnomer, as MDM solutions can also manage desktops and laptops.
With the correct MDM setup, your IT team can manage every device that can access your network, no matter what operating system it uses. When implemented, functionality, security, and flexibility should be retained across your organization.
In this article, we will fully explain how MDM works, its features and advantages, as well as the different MDM solutions available to you.
If you already employ an army of mobile devices, schedule a call with us today to see how we can help manage and secure your company’s fleet.
What is MDM?
MDM allows companies to organize their fleet of devices and manage them. Managing an entire fleet of devices demands the correct software, servers, policies, and processes.
Ultimately, MDM must be a mindset that is cultivated through a culture. MDM runs on hardware and is run through software, but true MDM happens when the correct ideas and decisions are executed.
The MDM agent is a piece of software that will allow administrators to monitor and control applications, security policies, and more.
The admin can decide which third-party applications can be installed on these devices, and what devices can access business-critical data. They can also wipe the device in case it is lost, stolen, or become the entry point for a data breach.
While these features add to cybersecurity, the agility of MDM comes through the ability to deploy custom settings to each new device that is onboarded to your organization.
Once an administrator sets up a standard deployment, they can leverage the MDM server to push these settings to new devices. They can even do so over the air (OTA), so the new device is already configured when it arrives at its end user.
Once settings are deployed to all devices, the admin can monitor the devices for signs of decline in performance or security. They can even detect if a device is nearing its end of life, so they can deploy and configure a new device before a user is taken offline
In total, MDM is hardware (servers and devices), software (MDM agent and management console), policies (security, access controls), and processes (proactive monitoring). Together, they create a whole new approach to our world of remote work.
MDM and BYOD
Before moving on to the individual features and advantages of MDM, we must acknowledge its specific importance in the modern business world.
COVID-19 changed the way we work, and since many more employees began working remotely, we have only continued to change our collective mindset about remote work.
In that time, remote workers have also begun using their personal devices, connected to their personal networks to connect remotely to business data.
The use of personal devices, or Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), can reduce costs for businesses in the short term by limiting the cost of purchasing hardware or office space.
More importantly, it can create massive security vulnerabilities for companies, exposing them to potentially irreparable costs via a data breach.
Since the massive shift to remote work in 2020, cybercriminals now target mobile devices and laptops that can give them a red carpet to business-critical data.
This puts the responsibility of enforcing protective measures on the company, and it can be managed easily through a proper MDM setup.
IT admins can use the MDM console to create policies that secure apps and data. They can also use the console to maintain their workers’ privacy, separating company data into a different app without gaining access to the rest of the device.
Because of the massive liabilities opened by personal devices, we recommend avoiding them altogether. Managing personal devices on your network is a risk not worth taking, and one that can be easily mitigated through some of the features MDM provides.
Read on for more details on how MDM can procure corporately-owned devices, and deploy them securely.
MDM Features
Now that we know the ‘what,’ and ‘why,’ of MDM, let’s talk about the ‘how.’ How does MDM add security and agility to your organization? How do these key features function, how can they be optimized, and how can we improve upon them?
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Procurement and Deployment
The right hardware is key to a productive team, but so is the right fit. Have you ever watched a lifetime Windows user try and operate MAC iOS? Worse yet, have you watched an Apple user try and operate Windows OS? It can be like speaking a different language for some people.
Naturally, your workforce will prefer to work on different hardware (desktop or laptop) and on different operating systems (Windows, Apple, or even Linux). We’ll cover the ability to deploy and manage these devices coming up, but what about just setting up these devices?
MDM platforms allow you to purchase devices from your (IT partner’s) trusted vendors and have them shipped directly to any destination you choose.
If your admin has set up a standard deployment setting for the piece of hardware and its operating system, MDM allows you to apply the setting while the hardware is in transit. This eliminates the need to ship hardware to one location where it can be configured, only to be shipped out to its user later.
With a fully functioning device right when you need it, employees will experience almost zero downtime, with no productivity lost.
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Management
Once a new device arrives, or all existing devices in your organization are onboarded to your MDM, it’s time to put that last ‘M’ into practice.
There are so many helpful ways that you can use MDM platforms to make your company safer and more productive than ever.
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Device tracking
Ideally, your entire workforce will be working off corporate-owned devices. You always want to know where those devices are, don’t you? Even if employees are accessing your network via a personal device, you should be able to know where it is.
The point is not to spy on your employees – rather know if a device with access to your data is in their possession. If a device turns up or is logged into from a foreign country or even two different states in an unreasonable amount of time, this could be a sign of a breach.
With features like Geofencing, you can set a geographical perimeter for devices that prohibit access from outside its borders. Some MDM consoles will also show you a unified map of all your devices.
If a device is lost, misplaced, or stolen, your data becomes vulnerable. In this case, the next feature can save you from disaster.
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Remote wipe
In the case that a corporate device finds itself in the hands of non-authorized personnel, MDM consoles give you the option to lock and/or wipe data off the device completely.This may sound like a drastic measure. Know that with the right combination of data backup and an MDM, the critical data and settings on your device can easily be restored.
Your data is what is important. With the right setup, the device is simply a vessel for the data itself.
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Identity and Access Controls
Identity Management and Access Controls are imperative measures for cybersecurity whether your devices are remote or on-premises. Even if you are not yet using an MDM, leveraging conditional access policies is key to security right away.
In short, Identity Management is the process of assigning profiles to each user in your organization. Access Controls are role-based if-then statements that govern who has access to what places and data.
These two facets of security are to protect your most sensitive data from those who do not need access to it. If someone’s daily role does not demand access to financial, personal, or any other data, they should not have express access to it. The same goes for locations within a physical location.
An MDM can help pre-configure these user profiles and their given access before their device even arrives. This protects you and your data on Day 1 of onboarding a new employee, with no added downtime.
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Endpoint security
MDM enhances your security through its ability to enforce security standards on every connected device, as well as to serve out a uniform set of apps and settings to any new device.
Again, this makes onboarding new hires a simple, efficient process. Once role-based conditional access policies are set, you can simply choose your new hire’s default setting and send their device to them with the same security as the rest of your team.
Consider these cybersecurity best practices:
Set company-wide password strength requirements. Enforce multi-factor authentication and single sign-on (SSO) settings. Configure automatic security update installation. Install antivirus software. Filter out access to unapproved URLs and applications.
All these actions and more can be taken in your MDM console and served out to every device on your network, new or old.
Conclusion
Employees and devices are spreading, which can add a lot of positives to an organization if approached correctly. Mobile Device Management (MDM) can help in several ways.
MDM can unify your workforce despite differing hardware and operating systems. It can push a standard group of security settings to every device that has access to your data. It can lock a lost device from afar.
Best of all, it can do all these things and more – immediately or in transit – so that you never lose a second of productivity.
Ategra IT has helped numerous organisations deploy, protect, and manage their team’s devices. Schedule a call with us today to talk to an MDM expert about how we can help you do the same.
