MobileIron Launches New Version Of Docs@Work To Secure Personal Cloud For Business

MobileIron said Wednesday it has launched a new version of its Docs@Work platform in what the company said solves the most important security challenge facing the enterprise today when it comes to the personal cloud.

A widespread problem throughout the mobile enterprise employees storing work-related documents in consumer cloud file-sharing apps, making IT departments sweat with corporate data out there unprotected. Docs@Work aims to address the issue by giving users their choice of content storage without giving up and security.

"The announcement really starts to tackle the concerns that we see a lot in our customer base of end users leveraging personal tools, like DropBox and others, to basically maintain corporate documents," said Jay Gordon, vice president of sales at Plano, Texas-based MobileIron partner Enterprise Mobile. "A lot of these end users are using BYOD or are even using their corporate devices and signing up for consumer versions of DropBox and Box.com and other solutions, and storing work-related documents. They are sharing them with their customers and peers and other folks in part of doing their jobs and that's just not a secure way for enterprise customers to manage that content today. It's a big problem for the enterprise. They don't have any idea where their content resides."

[Related: CRN Exclusive: CSC, MobileIron Partner To Bring Cloud-Based EMM To Federal Gov't Solutions]

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MobileIron's content security strategy is split into three phases. The first phase brings a new version of the company's Docs@Work app, which gives employees secure access to popular cloud file sharing apps.

Users will have access to content including DropBox, Microsoft Office 365, Microsoft OneDrive Pro and more, in a secure mobile interface. MobileIron says it's important to give users the option to use the applications they want, otherwise they'll go around it and find a different consumer app they like instead.

Next, it provides file-level security, making information in the personal cloud encrypted so it can't be accessed by unauthorized app users.

Finally, the app ecosystem is authorized by enterprise IT departments to access secured cloud data.

"It's a great tool," Gordon said. "It really starts to hit into a gap in the enterprise today that will be well received."

Gordon described the platform as "the first of its kind to embrace the ecosystem," as other's don't attack the issue in a way that allows users to use the consumer products.

"This problem of the personal cloud hits almost every employee," said MobileIron Vice President of Strategy Ojas Rege. "We feel this is a very broadly applicable problem that all enterprises will need to have an architecture to solve. We don't think this is specific to a particular industry. It would be independent of the country they're in, the size of the business, the industry they're in, because this fundamental question of 'How do you get your users content' is a question that all industries have because businesses are built around content and documents."

Rege says Docs@Work lets channel partners build a new set of services around content security and allows them to help their clients around content strategy. MobileIron is a 100 percent channel-focused company, allowing partners to sell the new platform along with the MobileIron package, without competition from the vendor.

The new Docs@Work app is available for iPads and iPhones in addition to Android tablets and smartphones.

PUBLISHED OCT. 22, 2014