Lost smartphone containing vulnerable data? There’s an app for that
June 23, 2010 by Steve HannafordPosted in: In this week's e-newsletter, Latest News & Views, New Products, Security
As smartphones like the iPhone, Android, Blackberry and others become more and more critical to business, they are becoming a major vulnerability in corporate data security. Such devices can store tons of corporate information, and they are very easy to lose or misplace.
One example: The recent incident in which a prototype of Apple’s recent iPhone upgrade was simply left behind in a California bar by an Apple employee, allowing an industry gossip site (and competitors) to get a good pre-release look at top-secret competitive data.
But a new application can help repair the damage from a lost (or stolen) smartphone. Apple recently announced a new solution for iPhone users that subscribe to their MobileMe connectivity and data syncing software. Apple recently announced a Find My iPhone app that can locate a lost iPhone (or iPad) using GPS coordinates and give you a map of its location. If you decide the device is compromised (not just under the sofa or under that pile of papers on your desk at work), you can do one of several things:
- Have the iPhone display a message (“If found, call the following number…)
- Have the iPhone play a sound for two minutes at full volume (mostly useful for finding it under the couch or next to the copier at work)
- Lock the iPhone remotely, requiring a password
- Wipe the iPhone storage of all personal data (to be later restored from backup when you get the phone back).
Now that devices that fit in your shirt pocket can hold more critical corporate data than you could store in a twenty-pound hard drive ten years ago, companies have to be thinking about such protective measures. We expect to see similar apps on all such devices in the near future.
Lost smartphone, vulnerable data? There’s an app for that
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Tags: iPhone, lost smartpone, MobileMe, smartphone security
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