Managing the Remote and Mobile Workforce

By Tom Schmidt

What is the biggest obstacle to the widespread adoption of remote and mobile computing in businesses worldwide today? According to a recent survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit, security concerns head the list. The survey found that more than 60% of companies are holding back on deployment because of security concerns. Close to 47% of respondents cited cost and complexity as a major obstacle to deployment. Moreover, nearly one in five businesses has already experienced financial loss due to attacks via mobile platforms.

This article looks at the primary issues that continue to impede the adoption of mobile technology in the workplace. It then proposes steps enterprises can take to genuinely manage mobile technology, and thus leverage it as a competitive advantage.

Threats are on the rise
The most recent Internet Security Threat Report, published in March, sheds light on some of the specific threats to today's mobile devices. The Report found that malicious code targeting mobile devices, particularly smart phones, continued to grow through the second half of 2005. (Smart phones are mobile phones that contain a fully fledged operating system with a wide variety of user-installable software.) It also described several new examples of malicious code for smart phones, including Cardtrp, which was the first cross-platform threat with the ability to affect both Symbian and Windows operating systems. In addition, the end of 2005 saw the emergence of Pbstealer, which is distributed as a file that poses as a phone book utility for smart phones in order to entice a user to download and execute it.

Once a device has been compromised by one of these Trojan horses, information such as the user's phonebook, notepad, calendar, and to-do list can be transmitted to Bluetooth-enabled devices that are within range. This may pose a serious breach of confidentiality, as sensitive contact information and appointments could be shared. According to the Threat Report, the risks connected with mobile data will increase as larger mobile networks become a more attractive target for cyber-criminals.

In addition, some of today's more complex worms and viruses, known as "blended threats," specifically target clients that roam outside the corporate infrastructure. Nimda, Code Red, SQLSlammer, and Blaster are examples of blended threats that hijacked mobile clients to gain unauthorized access to a corporate network via an external Internet connection.

Additional management challenges
Of course, security isn't the only concern when it comes to remote and mobile clients. One of the biggest challenges organizations face in managing, controlling, and securing these systems is that they don't maintain persistent connections. Days or weeks might pass before a remote or mobile client connects to the corporate network. And when the client finally does connect, there's no guarantee it will be a quality connection. Limited bandwidth, unreliable service, and frequent disconnected states all have the potential to create havoc for organizations trying to manage those systems, especially in relation to the following activities:

• Software distribution and patch management Scheduling software distribution or patch management tasks to occur automatically after-hours might work for the desktop systems in an organization, but those packages won't reach any of the mobile or remote clients not physically connected during the scheduled deployment. An effective management solution must offer more than this; it must also have the ability to deploy scheduled packages to offline systems the next time they connect. In addition, the solution needs to take into account the different circumstances that mobile and remote clients face. Thus it should offer optimization features such as package compression, checkpoint restart capabilities, and automated offline completion of software installs.
• Asset management This is another significant concern for remote or mobile clients. Whether it's to adhere to government regulations such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act or to avoid fines resulting from noncompliance with software licensing agreements, organizations must be able to track and monitor all of their systems. Solutions that perform asset management tasks need to be able to recognize when mobile or remote clients connect to the network and then execute the necessary inventory scans as needed. They must also be able to perform inventory scans offline to deal with the issue of slow, unreliable, and limited connections.
• Antivirus protection Most IT organizations go to great lengths to safeguard their digital assets from outside threats. Unfortunately, when mobile systems move outside the relative safety of their corporate defenses, their vulnerability to attack rises dramatically unless appropriate measures are taken. As part of an effective management solution, the security policy for mobile clients needs to be able to sense when a system connects from outside the corporate network and automatically adjust security protections accordingly. Organizations can also require that all remote access occur through the corporate virtual private network (VPN), which will block any traffic that doesn't come from within the secure walls of the corporate infrastructure.
• Disaster recovery It's essential to ensure that mobile workers' data is backed up. Unfortunately, intermittent connections make it difficult for these systems to be included in regularly scheduled enterprise backups. Organizations need to take advantage of disaster recovery solutions that not only enable automated data backup upon connection, but that allow users to work unimpeded while that backup process runs. Disk-to-disk disaster recovery solutions can completely automate the backup process, drastically reducing the need for human intervention. Remote control can also play a critical role in disaster recovery efforts.

Putting it all together
As the above issues make clear, the challenges of managing remote and mobile clients touch upon the different disciplines of systems, security, and storage management. That's why a well-managed infrastructure is one that can effectively converge these management efforts. As organizations unify their systems, security, and storage management efforts, they will have the agility to respond more quickly and effectively to the challenges they face. They will also have the ability to ensure improved business operations and continuity.

Tom Schmidt writes frequently about information security topics. He has more than 15 years' experience as a writer and editor in high-tech publishing.