Mobile technologies have ushered in sweeping productivity gains at enterprises across the globe. In many cases, they have been central to the creation of the so-called "real-time enterprise." These same technologies, however, have also increased enterprises' exposure to security risks that are frequently underestimated or misunderstood. How significant is the problem? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, within three years, 40 per cent of all workers will perform a significant part of their job outside of the office. . . .
Mobile technologies have ushered in sweeping productivity gains at enterprises across the globe. In many cases, they have been central to the creation of the so-called "real-time enterprise." These same technologies, however, have also increased enterprises' exposure to security risks that are frequently underestimated or misunderstood. How significant is the problem? According to the U.S. Census Bureau, within three years, 40 per cent of all workers will perform a significant part of their job outside of the office.

Research firm IDC shows a similar trend and estimates that two-thirds of the U.S. workforce will be considered mobile by 2006. For today's mobilized, real-time enterprise, it's time to get to work to secure all laptops, handhelds, and wireless devices.

Locking down laptops

According to the latest edition of the Symantec Internet Security Threat Report, more complex worms and viruses -- known in the security industry as "blended threats" -- are becoming the attack of choice among Internet vandals. Such threats are more sophisticated and often exploit several different flaws to increase the chance of infecting a computer system. The number of attacks that could be classified as a blended threat in the first half of 2003 was 20 percent higher than in the previous six months, according to the report.

That's especially disturbing news for employees and partners that regularly travel outside the perimeter firewall and connect to the network. Why? Because blended threats such as Nimda, Code Red, and Slammer specifically target laptops outside the firewall in order to gain unauthorized enterprise network access during an internet connection. (Laptop users can also become unwitting victims of Distributed Denial of Service, or DDoS, attacks.)

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