70% of Canadian companies do not know how their employees use their phones at work, leading to serious security concerns.
Ontario company SOTI surveyed IT managers at 350 companies across the country to find out how they manage their employees’ phones. The answer from 70% of them: We just can’t do it.
This is a problem for the IT security of these companies and also for their employees, as the work-related data that people process on their phones may be poorly protected. It could fall into the hands of malicious individuals, and since we know that many criminals resort to social hacking to recover content of this type, this represents a gap in computer security more broadly.
In the same survey, SOTI also found that 58% of Canadian companies that responded had a fleet of mobile devices that was too large for them to adequately manage.
43% of them say they don’t have the financial means to keep an eye on what others are doing with their phone, even if it’s provided by their employer. Finally, this inability to properly integrate mobility into their daily activities is delaying digital transformation for half of the companies surveyed.
This is a major challenge that occurs in three phases. First, Canadian companies face the risk of not adequately regulating what their employees can and cannot do on their work cell phones. Then the employees themselves neglect their own safety and that of their colleagues. Ultimately, affected companies are likely to lose opportunities to increase their productivity by not taking enough account of the potential of IT mobility in their activities.