The way business professionals work has changed dramatically over the last several years, and continues to at an ever-growing rate. They are on the go and working from different locations across all hours using many devices to allow for a work/life balance. We have become an “always-on” society.

Workers are also doing more work remotely, whether it be at a coffee shop, on the train to work, or on a business trip from a hotel room. People want to stay in touch wherever they are and whenever they need to. They also want to use the device they like, whether it is a smartphone, tablet or laptop. In addition, they also need access to the applications they choose to use, some from their work, others of their own. And most importantly, they need access to the data required to do their jobs, whether it is online through the Internet or behind their company’s firewall on the intranet.

Companies clearly need to find a way to provide their mobile workers secure access to any data from any device at any time. That said, companies’ IT organizations need to understand the risks they are opening themselves up to if they don’t take necessary precautions including data loss, malware, device proliferation, rogue applications, lost and stolen devices with data onboard, credential theft, etc.

Today, IT can implement a number of solid mobile workforce management and mobile security management tools to help secure mobile data and devices, such as:

• Mobile Device Management (MDM)
• Mobile Application Management (MAM)
• Secure Sockets Layer Virtual Private Network (SSL VPN)
• Network Access Control (NAC)

Learn more about what the industry is seeing around providing secure mobile access over BYOD by reading our executive brief, “Ready or not, mobile workers and BYOD are here to stay.”