First it was BYOD,
but no sooner are IT staff getting used to the idea of staff using
unsanctioned and unprotected iPads and smartphones in the workplace than
a new danger has emerged – the personal cloud.
What is the personal cloud?
"The
personal cloud refers to cloud storage and collaboration solutions
designed for consumers," says Ojas Rege, VP Strategy, MobileIron. A
flexible and user-friendly place to store personal digital content, and
always accessible, services include Dropbox (the 'king of the cloud' at
175 million users), Google Drive, Microsoft's OneDrive, Apple's iCloud
and many others. All deal in online storage and file synchronisation –
and all are hosting potentially sensitive corporate files from every
workplace.
Recent research from Trustmarque indicates that 40% of
British office workers admit to using cloud applications that haven't
been sanctioned or provided by IT departments. "As personal cloud
continues to encroach on workplaces, businesses will have to change the
way they deal with employees who want to use personal cloud, by
empowering rather than restricting them," says Angelo di Ventura,
Director, Trustmarque.
"It's all about how we access the IT we
need," says Peter Tebbutt, UK&I Country Leader, Alcatel-Lucent
Enterprise. "We all have a collection of applications, web destinations,
online services or content that we use in our personal or professional
lives, and we want access to this unique collection regardless of which
device we may be using." Ojas Rege, VP Strategy, MobileIron, thinks shadow IT needs to be embraced
How are personal clouds changing workplace IT?
In short: shadow IT.
"Shadow IT is the use of technology outside IT's official mandate,"
explains Rege. "In the past, IT has tried to shut it down, but the
personal cloud is so popular with employees that they use it regardless
of whether they've been granted permission … the IT department is
struggling with whether to restrict or support it, and how to actually
pursue either option."
The reason is simple. "Employees are used
to having all their content and data available in one place, easily
accessible on any device, and don't understand why that isn't an option
at work," says di Ventura. "This is creating a challenge for CIOs and IT
Directors, who must move their focus away from being the builders of IT
systems to becoming the brokers of cloud services." He thinks that
computing will change as we see more businesses considering
cloud-enabled self-service, single sign-on and identity lifecycle
management to simplify adoption, and reduce risk.
"One challenge
today is that Microsoft is no longer the default choice – Apple,
Android, and BlackBerry have changed the expectation of the workplace
and operating platform," says Tebbut. "Microsoft has lost its monopoly
position and this will drive innovation and choice. Applications will
have to work on multiple platforms, and computing will need to support
this – and the personal cloud is a key driver and enabler of this." 40% of British office workers use a personal cloud app in the workplace
What dangers does the personal cloud bring?
Security – or lack of. Personal cloud applications are unsecured and invisible to IT departments; potentially sensitive enterprise data now resides on a server the company can't protect.
"You
and your organisation are now relying on a provider that has no
contractual obligation to your company to keep it secure," says Martin
Warren, Cloud Solutions Marketing Manager, NetApp. "And what happens to
that data if an employee leaves a company, either voluntarily or
otherwise?"
However, employees working remotely will do whatever
they have to do to make their work-life as streamlined as possible. "The
personal cloud makes employees more productive," says Rege, who thinks
that saying no is not an option – it will fall on deaf ears.
"As a
result, IT must look at different ways of securing data, such as
file-level security rather than storage-level security so that data can
remain secure regardless of where employees store it." The challenge is
to enforce security policies across authorised and unauthorised cloud
services without affecting employees' productivity.
That means no
corporate firewall. Trustmarque's research found that 27% of cloud
users said they had used cloud services and applications to get around
the restrictions of corporate IT, which include limited data storage and
email attachment limits.
"The result is that employees are
putting corporate data and networks at risk – one in five cloud users
even admitted to uploading sensitive company information to file sharing
and personal cloud storage applications," says di Ventura. "IT
departments must be able to analyse the activities that pose the
greatest risk – such as sharing data outside the company – and block
them specifically to mitigate risk."
