Comments on: Wanted: One Mobile Device, for a 24/7 Life

By: Mobile Virtualization Bringing One Phone for Both Work and Play: Tech News «

Tue, 07 Dec 2010 15:47:21 +0000

[...] to surpass computer sales by the end of 2012. And as enterprise workers buy personal smartphones, they’re not likely to find it appealing to carry both their own phone and a work phone. I’d say Krishnamurti has found his use [...]

By: Gadgespec

Gadgespec — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 16:17:58 +0000

Richard, this DiVitas solution sounds interesting but my question will be what about the battery challenge when it comes to any services that uses WIFI on these cellphones? I am using one of the Sakhumzantsi phones and also have tried a couple of WIFI serices on Nokia N80 and I think for every one WIFI challenges the battery capacity.

By: Shut Up and Drive! How to Identify — and Deal With — Cell Phone Abuse

Sun, 30 Aug 2009 14:02:03 +0000

[...] will acknowledge. The most common productivity killers: obtrusive alerts at all hours of the day, cross-contamination of professional and personal correspondence, and multimedia diversions such as Facebook and [...]

By: When the Cell Phone Is the Office Phone, Taxing It Is Wrong | 123 All Reviews

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:51:52 +0000

[...] standard office hours; we conduct business everywhere, all the time. This makes cell phones a necessary tool for many employees 24/7 (we can debate the merits of that later). For example, I have a cell phone that GigaOM reimburses [...]

By: When the Cell Phone Is the Office Phone, Taxing It Is Wrong

When the Cell Phone Is the Office Phone, Taxing It Is Wrong — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 17:29:16 +0000

By: Barry

Barry — Wed, 27 May 2009 23:10:09 +0000

Your point on Device Management companies need to be updated. MobileIron has Selective Wipe Feature allow you to browse the file structure and delete just a selected folder or just encrypted, or just email, and on and on.

By: McGuire’s Law » Blog Archive » Observations: Devices - May 23, 2009

Sun, 24 May 2009 00:23:03 +0000

[...] Wanted: One Mobile Device, for a 24/7 Life [...]

By: Richard

Richard — Mon, 18 May 2009 16:00:37 +0000

Check out DiVitas Networks: http://blog.divitas.com/blog/divitas-networks/0/0/companies-are-turning-to-divitas-mobile-uc-during-belt-tightening-economy. DiVitas is FMC software that runs on a $99 Nokia E71x and addresses all of the issues mentioned above in addition to saving money (WiFi calls don’t count against the carrier plan and are free of charge).

– it has Dual Persona, which means you can place private calls and maintain a private database from the native (SIM card) number while business contacts are made from the corporate deskphone number (and reside in an corporate-managed contact database).
- It is IT managed
- You can use corporate Presence and IM directly from the E71x
- FMC enables seamless roaming between WiFi and cellular (free, uninterrupted calling from WiFi)
- WiFi calls have landline-like voice quality so no choppy cellphone calls when you are in WiFi range.
- your mobile phone behaves just like a deskphone (same number, call forward, extension dialing, etc.)

By: Sharon Peleg

Sharon Peleg — Mon, 18 May 2009 09:47:56 +0000

Guys, it looks the industry is on the verge of the right solution – Mobile Virtualization. One of the more interesting use-cases promised by all virtualization proponents and OEMs is the one that suggests a ‘Trusted Domain’ for the IT of the organization, immune from any possible SW attack, possibly also storing encrypted data. In such a world, a lost device needs not erase even 1 single bit of data, assuming the right infrastructure will be in place. Even more, it could transmit the stored data (without the ability to block it). Similarly other stake holders can have their ‘trusted domain’ such as operators offering their own managed content & services.
Stretching further the imagination, we could even think of ‘Occasional Management Authorities’ such as public place which require obeying some rule such as muting the ringer. If the user accepts it, the device could automatically temporarily change some function WITHOUT the ability to override it till the device leaves the premises (concert hall, hospital, Airplane, etc.)

By: Brian McTavish

Brian McTavish — Mon, 18 May 2009 08:38:58 +0000

Perhaps I’m ignorant of some factor but this seems an inefficient road to go down.
Why does mixed personal/ business data functionality need hardware re-engineering, and why need it happen on the device itself?
Can it not be implemented more flexibly with existing capabilities – e.g. tagging files, directories, and individual records by their owner, determining differential access and remote synchronisation preferences? If I have an easily reinstated copy of my personal data off my phone, why would I care who owns my device or whether they feel the need to wipe it when I leave? I may even *want* that.
Having said that, it is a surprise that the two-lines on one phone option hasn’t advanced further: calls to family via my personal number; boss on the work line. Half-hearted solutions exist: http://www.pixmania.co.uk/uk/uk/xx/16216/xx/25/6/criteresn.html , and Orange UK used to offer a two-lines one-SIM option. But again, isn’t this best handled centrally: incoming and outgoing routing via the personal/ business status of the contact/ time of day/ my location/ busy status? Exactly the track I understand Google Voice is going down.

By: Amir Katz

Amir Katz — Mon, 18 May 2009 08:00:25 +0000

Device management is the optimal solution, leveraging the OMA (Open Mobile Alliance) organization standards, thus ensuring a non-proprietary protocol and wide acceptance across different devices.
Data wiping is already supported by using the LAWMO (Lock And Wipe Management Object), but to fully support the enterprise data management, implementation is required both on the device side (LAWMO client) and on the server side (LAWMO server) – corporate data (documents, contacts, certificates, etc.) must be tagged as such when they are stored on the device and then the LAWMO implementation needs to find those tagged documents/items and delete them upon performing a data wipe operation.

By: Balaji Natarajan

Balaji Natarajan — Mon, 18 May 2009 06:48:46 +0000

I thought Palm could have gone a step beyond too – in rounding off the Synergy Feature with more differentiators…Kudos on your Cobalt efforts.

By: Balaji Natarajan

Balaji Natarajan — Mon, 18 May 2009 06:40:46 +0000

Good analysis Ken…

“The corporate/private data is on a users mobile device, and backed up on a users or companies laptop, and if they’re following good backup processes at home, on a users home computer as well. Wiping a users mobile device with an expectation of removing proprietary corporate information, knowing that, is pointless”

Although I agree it’s common practice to backup corporate data on home computers, it’s important to note whether your IT department is certifying such a move via the Policy document every employee signs off about maintaining the integrity of corporate data 24*7*365….(We can argue that we all do it everyday anyway – that’s a different story..)

Regarding storing personal data on “company-owned” laptops, yes – Google Cloud, Amazon S3 can step up & help – going forward, by storing the personal data on the cloud – but again, not sure if companies would be ready to pay for such tools (when usual IT Policy states usage of “company-owned” devices are restricted for company use only & not personal use)….I do have some casual personal information stored on my company laptop – but i don’t “depend” on it being the primary source of my personal information.

The situation is starkly different when the model = “user-owned” device + “company-paid” services , which seems to be a more prevalent model in smartphones….

Overall, I agree with the theme that this is definitely a broader-picture issue on data ownership models & associated security, storage — not limited to on-device only. Given the hybrid ownership model between user & company (in terms of smartphones) – i think, this happens to be a key use-case for the broader-picture issue. So any solution should just be a step in the right direction!

By: One Mobile Device, for a 24/7 Life « Innovation 2.0 and…

One Mobile Device, for a 24/7 Life « Innovation 2.0 and… — Mon, 18 May 2009 06:03:03 +0000

[...] From GIGAOM [...]

By: Ryan

Ryan — Mon, 18 May 2009 04:48:27 +0000

I feel that a host-oriented, application-based solution is the best way to go. While the iphone has its constraints, more phones are coming (Android, etc) that should resolve some of the issues. Give me a phone that I own, but run apps that the corp deploys.

By: Ken Wallich

Ken Wallich — Sun, 17 May 2009 16:43:47 +0000

While trying to make data taggable on a mobile device might at first seem great in this scenario, as prior commenters have mentioned, the problem is far more general. The corporate/private data is on a users mobile device, and backed up on a users or companies laptop, and if they’re following good backup processes at home, on a users home computer as well. Wiping a users mobile device with an expectation of removing proprietary corporate information, knowing that, is pointless. Solving the problem of proprietary data at an endpoint is a partial solution. Companies are ultimately still relying on employees following their IP agreement, and removing such data on their own.

Consider the inverse problem, a corporate laptop with a users personal data on it. Upon separation, users would like to remove their private data, personal address book and email certainly, before returning company equipment, but in many scenarios, don’t have the ability to do this.

If you generalize the problem of data tagging, a unified solution presents itself by jumping up and down and waving “hey, over here, look over here”… encrypted storage of data, decrypted on-the-fly with revokable access keys. Think S3. Enhanced with having data cachable on a device, with a timeout on re-authentication so one can work on a document on a plane, for instance, or anywhere 24×7 access to corporate authentication isn’t available.

This also allows individuals to turn off access to personal data on a device after they’ve surrendered it, and viola you’ve also solved the problem for corporate and personal data, stolen mobile devices and laptops. Just revoke access to the data on the device!

A couple existing technologies? S3 from Amazon, and lastpass, a password manager that stores sensitive data encrypted on their servers. Mobile access to S3 exists through many apps on Android and the iPhone, lastpass has an iphone app in development. And, of course, the company who’s building that very solution for all your data? Google. Surprise!

This method doesn’t stop someone who really wants to steal and archive corporate data from doing so, but that’s a significantly harder problem that companies have to deal with on any highly confidential need-to-know information.