Mobile security and BYOD: An inexorable link

This week, Zscaler Vice President of Security Research Michael Sutton appeared in Fox Business to discuss mobile privacy and provided additional commentary into reports that Android devices were found sold complete with malware out of the box.

These articles present a good opportunity for a quick discussion of mobile security and BYOD. I spoke with Zscaler GM and SVP of Mobile Security Solutions Sudhi Herle about BYOD and security, who had some interesting thoughts to share.

Herle says that "BYOD implies that the device manufacturer has taken precise steps to ensure the integrity of the device firmware, so that it cannot be easily changed to an unauthorized version. iOS, Windows and Samsung KNOX devices implement this hardening, but non-Samsung Android devices can be more easily replaced with 3rd party firmware, which can then be rooted to disable existing security precautions."

Many enterprises are unaware of the connection between BYOD security and device integritiy, which is a primary cause for the lack of Android adoption in the enterprise.