Terminate [Your Phone] with Extreme Prejudice

Most big companies these days have security guidelines regarding their BYOD programs. For an unnamed defense contractor mentioned in this Bitglass post: http://blog.bitglass.com/the-next-byod-security-craze, that policy is that no classified data could be downloaded to personal mobile devices.

People being people, it only took about a week for somebody to break that rule. An employee sent out a classified email through the corporation’s standard mail delivery system rather than sending it through the confidential network. The recipients now had classified US government data on their day-to-day iPhones.

Oops.

Almost comically, the solution the contractor and the government came up with was for the IT department to confiscate the phones (using real FBI agents for the one employee who refused to comply) and send them off for disposal.

Disposal meaning incineration.

In true tribute to overkill, the phones were secured “in a steel container, locked with 6 padlocks, and placed onto a Government truck, where they were escorted to a secure incineration facility.” Then the phones were placed into a vat of molten metal and destroyed T-1000 style.

Paranoia it seems has infiltrated big data.

Not to worry though. With vigilant monitoring, a company can ensure that nothing could slip past its digital defenses. Such monitoring is the type of service provided by AccelOps.

AccelOps software helps manage your databases; applications; network equipment, security, and data flow; and establishes a baseline for normal activity so that any fishy business is sniffed out immediately and brought to your attention. No need for phone incineration. Just a standard remote wipe at most. If anybody still manages to steal data and access your networks, you’ll know, and you can stop the hacker before he succeeds.

Need help dealing with paranoia? Contact us. We’re here to help.