Remote Worker Worries: On The Road With Their Guards Down

A couple of items recently caught by the bMighty ANTenna ought to have your own security antennae twitching at full alert. The combination of remote workers and more powerful mobile devices could be setting up a perfect storm of security woes.Take a look at ANTenna's piece on the results of a Cisco study of remote worker behavior. Your off-site people evidently know more about security than they did a year ago, but also think the Internet is safer than it was a year ago. Two survey results -- two wrong answers (if you think the Internet is safer now than in the past, you're thinking is wrong.)

They also click on unknown e-mails, and many are moving work materials from business devices to personal ones at will.

The other ANTenna vibration affects security by implication... but it's a big implication. Faster and cheaper mobile memory, as the ANTenna staff points out, means more and more powerful and more and more capable phones and other mobile devices, which means more and more (and more!) opportunities for remote staff (and away-from-the-desk-staff, too) to couple the convenience of their phones' power to business data. Couple that with sloppy security behavior and you're looking at a whole new wave of potential problems.

Step one, from my perspective? Find out what your staff -- remote and site-based -- really know (and don't know) about Internet security -- then set them straight.

Step two, find out how they're using their devices -- including personal devices used even occasionally for business purposes. Then -- this is a safe bet, even without the survey results to forewarn us -- set them straight.

Step three, get ready for the next round of challenges as the next generation of faster, cheaper, more powerful and -- not just for user reasons -- probably more vulnerable devices reach your employees' hands.