With the increase in the need for accessibility of applications and data anywhere, anytime, and with the advent of technology and apps supporting the growth, the use of mobile devices has grown multi folds over the years. Every organization has an increasing need for mobile device usage to increase productivity. When we say devices, it’s a term that is very relevant for laptops, tablets, Chromebooks, and other devices apart from mobiles. Productivity boost happens with the use of these devices apart from desktops.
Providing mobile phones to each employee in the organization is a significant cost overhead. There is an increasing trend and popular culture of companies adopting BYOD(Bring your own device) to meet the demand and increase productivity keeping the costs low. In such cases, you are giving employees access to corporate data via their personal devices, which becomes a significant security risk. Higher the level of access, the bigger the risk it poses. It’s vital to strike the right balance between data accessibility and security. To achieve this balance, we adopt mobile device management.
Mobile Device Management is the process of enforcing policies in devices that employees use to access corporate data to prevent data leakage and unauthorized access. The admins always make sure to have the right corporate policies so that data can be secure. They also need to ensure ease of use and minimum business hindrance. Ultimately, end users or employees shouldn’t feel that they cannot do their day-to-day work because of these extra policy enforcements.
MDM capabilities can become highly critical for data protection. Thus if your organization is already on Google workspace, you should utilize the available features to get the best out of the platform. Some key MDM capabilities like erasing data from a device, Lock screen, device encryption, and managing what applications the users access are needed. Admins also get the flexibility to manage all the user’s devices in the organization in one place. With Google MDM, you also get the flexibility to let users bring their own devices and not restrict them or compel them to use the company devices only. It is also quite user-friendly to install, and the policies are instantly pushed to the user’s devices.
There are 2 types of MDM types available in Google Workspace. We will discuss the features of each of them below:
This MDM type is agentless, i.e.; it does not require the user to install anything on their device. Thus, there are limited capabilities that the basic MDM covers. Some of the essential features are:
This inventory lists all users’ devices to sign in to Google to access company data. In the inventory, you can see information like the last synchronized time, user details, device type, and other device details. All device actions can always be taken by choosing an entry from this inventory. All the devices are displayed in this inventory if a user has multiple devices synced.
Administrators can protect organizational data by setting policies requiring users to set passwords, pins, or screen locks to protect their devices. This is essential to prevent a data breach if the device is in the wrong hands. Users are generally alert if their password doesn’t comply with organizational policies.
Every app needs some permissions to access your corporate data. So, reviewing all applications that need access before allowing them is essential. It becomes imperative to check what access is required by the applications and if there is a scope for data leakage. Its also best to identify key usage for your company, whitelist trusted and well-known apps, and try not to have similar apps with duplicate functionality.
If a device is non-compliant or compromised, it’s a potential security threat to your organization. You should regularly get reports of these devices and get them removed from your environment. Ensuring that the devices stay up to date is key, and Google Workspace audit reports help you immensely.
Along with all features provided with Basic MDM, Google Workspace offers advanced MDM management options on certain subscriptions. Some of the available subscriptions are below:
Suppose you want to control who accesses your environment and ensure every new device is checked and approved. In that case, you can establish a device approval process that heavily adds to your security.
How likely is it that an employee loses their corporate phone? Probably very likely. In such cases, Google Workspace allows administrators to remote wipe the device so that corporate data is removed from the device.
Though Basic MDM provides password enforcement, it can be heightened with the advanced MDM capabilities that enforce a strong password with stringent password guidelines, thus increasing security. Policies can also include automatic device wipes if the password is entered several times incorrectly.
There are a lot of other advanced features, and Google goes a long way to provide everything in its offering via Google Workspace. We at Cloudasta help organizations get onboarded to Google Workspace and ensure that the security posture is at a reasonable level. If you want to understand more about the features and ensure you stay ahead of the game, feel free to contact us. If you are already in any existing collaboration environment, we can also help you to move to Google Workspace using our managed migration offering. Migrations are always seamless; ultimately, you get more and can utilize the features well with Google.
