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Vodafone Selects Giesecke & Devrient Platform for Secure Mobile Access to Cloud Services
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Vodafone Selects Giesecke & Devrient Platform for Secure Mobile Access to Cloud Services

March 07, 2012

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By Kerry Doyle,
Contributing Writer

Social media have become an integral part of consumer technology, and an increasing number of employees are bringing mobile devices into the workplace. As organizations grapple with the increasing prevalence of a mobile workforce — laptop, smartphone, and tablet users — they face a unique set of issues. Providing secure access, controlling the sheer number and diversity of mobile devices in the workplace, ensuring data security along with infrastructure integrity, and combining social media with business processes all represent significant challenges.


Now, Vodafone (News - Alert) Germany has chosen Giesecke & Devrient (G&D) to develop innovative security solutions based on standard SIM cards. In addition to controlling mobile access to company networks with one-time passwords sent by SMS, the new platform enables additional encryption of voice, e-mail, and SMS communication between users. It’s become an accepted fact that bringing your own device (BYOD) to work has its advantages: user comfort, social media access for business tasks, and near 24/7 responsiveness all translate to increased user productivity. However, mobile devices, especially laptops, also increase the possibility of malware infiltrations and viruses that can quickly spread throughout a network. Moreover, rampant device disorganization requires an already overextended IT to systematize and monitor an ever-expanding range of devices. The increased use of smart devices in the workplace poses significant control and support problems for IT.

The new G&D platform includes the use of digital signatures and the encryption of data stored on the mobile device, a feature that is critical if a device is lost or stolen, significantly easing the burden on IT. According to Michael Kuemmerle, Group Executive – Mobile Security at G&D, “Security has an increasingly important role to play in the digital world. The new SIM-based solution which Vodafone is implementing is one way we are securing the mobile future. Our focus is on creating user-friendly, cost-effective applications which meet our customers’ needs, in this case without having to introduce additional security hardware.”

Mobile devices in the workplace include accelerated business communications (managing contacts, email, social media, calendaring, etc.) and Web application access. In addition, smart device owners will often use device vendors for support, reducing the pressure on IT. The cost savings this represents for enterprises and SMBs alike should not be overlooked and can be substantial. Now, with added security control and support offered by providers such as G & D, as well as the functionality offered by cloud computing, companies should be able to have a wealth of choices.

Vodafone's business and public sector customers – who require sophisticated IT security – are one of the groups that stand to benefit most from this new security platform solution. According to Jan Geldmacher, CCO of Vodafone Germany's Enterprise Business Unit for corporate customers, “Security is founded on trust. Successfully launching innovative technologies to open up the digital world means keeping people firmly in focus – after all, you will only accept a new technology if you trust it. Giesecke & Devrient (News - Alert) is the ideal partner for us here. The government trusts them to print banknotes and passports, so they couldn’t be more reliable.”

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Edited by Rich Steeves
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