BYOD has become a new workplace standard. However, you have to create some rules before allowing your employees to use their personal devices. You should create and enforce a BYOD security policy. This policy will help you in protecting your business from both insider and outsider attacks. In this article, we are going to share some tips that will help you in improving your BYOD security.

Advantages of BYOD

There are various benefits of BYOD policy. If you are executing your BYOD policy correctly, then it will easily outweigh the risks. Your employees will work faster as they will have access to their familiar devices.

According to a report from Sapho, BYOD policy will help your employees in saving 81 minutes/week. Thus, it will also help you in saving a lot of money as your employees can do more work. Also, 81% of employees think that BYOD promotes work-life balance.

However, there are also security concerns about using the BYOD policy. More than 50% of businesses have already experienced some data breach due to the BYOD policy.

Most businesses don’t have access to IT security resources. Thus, they can’t effectively manage their BYOD policy. If you are allowing too many devices and OS in your network, then it will stretch your IT resources. It will become very difficult to manage your network. However, you don’t need a large IT security team for managing your network.

Create security policies for your devices

You should create stringent security policies before allowing your employees to use their personal devices. Most users don’t use complicated passwords for protecting their devices. However, if they are using unsecured devices, then your whole network can get breached.

Your BYOD security policy should include these guidelines:

Make sure that your employees are using a strong password for protecting their personal devices.
Where will your employees store their data? Make sure that they can’t store sensitive data in their personal devices.
Make sure that your employees are using a firewall and antivirus software for protecting their personal devices.
You should enforce inactivating timeout controls. This will ensure that your employee’s devices will automatically get locked.
You should ensure that your IT team can remotely wipe the data of devices if they get lost or stolen.
If your employees are leaving your company, then you should check their personal devices first.
You should use mobile device management solutions for protecting your employee’s mobile devices.

The strictness of these security guidelines is going to depend on your business requirements. For example, if you are in the finance or healthcare industry, then you need to enforce more restrictions. You should build your security policies according to your business size and regulatory requirements.

Define Acceptable use policy

These policies will help you in stopping malware and viruses from entering your systems. You should determine the applications that your employees can access.

You might need to block some websites from your network. Also, you should implement some policies for banning your employees if they are storing illicit materials.

If you want to enjoy the benefits of BYOD policy, then you should focus on creating a trusting environment. Make sure that they know about the best BOYD policies.

Use Mobile Device Managed (MDM) tool

This software will help you in managing, monitoring, and configuring your BYOD devices. Thus, your IT team can implement all the settings from a central solution.

This software will give a lot of power to your IT team. Your team can automatically backup your data and devices. They can perform vulnerability scans from a centralized location. Also, they can update the antivirus applications that your employees are using. They can wipe stolen or lost devices without accessing them. In simple words, MDM will help you in enforcing all your security policies.

Communicate BYOD policies to your employees

These policies are not going to succeed until your employees know about them. However, more than 77% of businesses never train their employees.

A BYOD training curriculum will help you in protecting your business from a data breach. Also, your employees will become more productive with time. You should clearly communicate with your employees and other parties. This will ensure that your employees know about these BYOD policies.

You should create a guidebook for your employees. Your employees can follow this guidebook. Training will ensure that your employees actually know about safe device usage.

You should ensure that your employees are signing an agreement. This agreement will ensure that your employees have actually read your BYOD policy. This agreement will protect your business from various liabilities that are connected with your employees. If your employees engage in illegal activities, then you won’t be responsible for it.

Employees exit plan

Sometimes your employees will leave your company. It is important to remove their access from your business data and networks. If you are not removing their access, then it will eventually lead to security issues. BYOD checklist should be part of your employee exit interview. It should include the following things:

Disable their company emails.
Wipe all the company-issued devices.
Change their passwords.

This checklist will ensure that your ex-employees can’t access your data and applications. Sometimes your disgruntled employees can leak your data. Thus, it is important to ensure that they don’t have access to your data.

Conclusion

BYOD has become unavoidable for most of the employees. Most employees are working remotely now and you can’t stop them from using their own devices. Thus, you should ensure that you are enforcing a secure BYOD policy. Your BYOD policy should cover all the bases. This will help you in increasing the productivity of your employees. Experienced MSPs like Bleuwire can help you in creating a secure BYOD policy. They will ensure that your network is protected from attackers. Thus, they will help you in avoiding costly data breaches. If you need more information regarding IT security services, then you can contact Bleuwire.

Contact us today to learn about Bleuwire™ services and solutions in how we can help your business.