Employees Working Remotely Need Secure Mobile Endpoint Devices

As the coronavirus continues to impact the world and we learn more about the scale and scope, one result is the surge in remote workers. Multiple news sites are reporting that throughout Europe including Germany, China, Italy, Japan, and South Korea, workers have been on lockdown, and are now working from home. 

Last week, the same happened in Seattle. Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft and Google all told employees to work from home. Twitter and payment company Square employees are also working remotely. And human resource departments everywhere are making contingency plans that include keeping workers home. While this will help reduce the spread of the coronavirus, there are security risks associated with remote work, especially related to unprotected mobile endpoints.

The fact is, we protect our traditional endpoints with antivirus, VPNs, anti-spyware and every “anti-X solution” we can find and have them access information and resources through corporate firewalls. However, the same doesn’t apply to mobile devices, even though mobile devices contain or access virtually the same information as our laptops and computers. 

While some remote workers will use traditional endpoints like laptops, an increasing number will use mobile endpoints like phones and tablets.  Ensuring these mobile endpoint devices are secure has always been important but with the quantity of remote workers growing significantly (some with minimal experience on how to work remotely), it’s even more critical for any organization or government agency. 

Security risks increase for organizations not accustomed to having large numbers of its employees work from home but needing to find ways to enable remote work in a very short period of time.  Given the urgency, it’s tempting to shortcut security. But this isn’t an either or choice. Mobile endpoint security can, and should, be deployed quickly to protect your organization.

Attackers know they can exploit this new scenario and will always attack the path of least resistance for the greatest return on their investment. It’s critical we secure mobile endpoints at any time but even more now when the number of people accessing data remotely grows significantly. 

Zimperium offers a complete suite of mobile security solutions to protect your organization’s remote, corporate and BYOD users.  You can find more information at Zimperium.com or here.  

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