By KERRY SMITH, Editor, St. Louis Construction News & Review Magazine
As the amount of sensitive project data transmitted from construction sites is increasing exponentially, so is the need to remotely manage and protect that information.
Mobile device management or MDM has been in existence for years. Security software that is capable of monitoring, managing and securing employees’ mobile devices – namely their smartphones – is and has been a reality within a myriad of industries. But for the design and construction industry in particular, tracking who is transmitting what from where to whom in real time is critical.
“If you have mobile device management capability, it means that the owner of the device – the construction company in this scenario – has full access to its intellectual assets,” said Brad Hagemeyer, a technician with St. Charles-based eTech Solutions. “It puts you, the owner of the smartphone, in control with regard to what information is being shared and with whom. If necessary, at a moment’s notice you’re able to wipe sensitive data from the phone, selectively delete information from it, remove contacts or even render the device inoperable,” he added. “And all this can be done remotely in very little time.”
Hagemeyer says that Apple keeps device owners and operators at arm’s length when it comes to accessing and controlling data. “That being said, however, Apple does allow remote managing of the device in terms of usage,” he said. “And with an Android device, you’re able to tap into an unlimited range of mobile device management applications.”
For construction companies whose mobile devices are held by project executives, project managers, estimators and many others, MDM is a necessity in order to protect the privacy of client data. And in a human resources context, MDM enables a firm to ensure that the devices are being used only for what the company intends, according to Teresa Whitcomb, chief financial officer at St. Peters-based Blanton Construction.
“Our customer security is very important to us,” Whitcomb said. “Although the construction industry in particular has a more transient workforce, we still need to enable that communication and also to monitor usage. MDM allows us to restrict mobile device usage from sites that are not work-related, to monitor and control bandwidth usage and to be able to lock down and secure data in the unfortunate case where we do have a termination. Keeping company assets – smartphones and tablets – secure is essential, especially in our industry where so much of the information sharing that we do takes place at the job site.”
In the event that a device is unintentionally lost, stolen or damaged, MDM allows for near-immediate lockdown of the device, according to Hagemeyer. “MDM also makes it possible for contractors to monitor the location where the mobile device is being utilized,” he said. “For example, with MDM a company can track whether a particular worker is transmitting data from where he is supposed to be at any given time and within geographic parameters. Mobile geofencing is the use of GPS or RFID (radio-frequency identification) technology to create a virtual geographic boundary, enabling software to trigger a response whenever a mobile device enters or leaves a particular area. If the worker assigned to the device is supposed to be at a particular job site from 7am to 3pm but leaves the job site at 2pm, by tracking the device’s most recent IP address, the geolocator can send a message to the manager that his worker has left the job site.”
Hagemeyer and Whitcomb said there’s often a misconception with regard to mobile device management that its purpose is to act as “big brother” with regard to surveillance of the nature of the data being transmitted. “That’s really not what MDM is all about,” said Hagemeyer. “As a third-party monitoring agency, we cannot see the actual data and we don’t want to see it. Unlike computer systems, our monitoring software does not remote in and see screen shares of information. What we monitor for construction companies and other clients depends upon the degree of control they want to have over the devices they own, devices that are a company’s intellectual assets. A big facet of what we do for contractors is to control the use of their devices for activities that are directly relevant to their employees’ work. If that device is also being used to stream YouTube videos, Netflix or anything like that which really racks up data usage, we have the capability of knowing about it instantly and restricting the device,” he added.
Monitoring and controlling a contractor’s entire fleet of mobile devices can translate into significant telecommunications cost savings in the short term and long term, Hagemeyer says. “If the company is paying $3,700 a month, for example, for usage of its mobile devices, initiating MDM and taking control of those company-owned assets can immediately spell significant savings,” he said. “In this scenario, we were able to reduce the firm’s telecom bill by approximately $2,000 or 54 percent.”
Whitcomb says employing MDM is a wise human resource strategy for any company, particularly one whose daily scope of work includes large amounts of sensitive data being transmitted remotely from and to job sites.
“Working with eTech Solutions and using (Cisco) Meraki software has enabled us to restrict our band width usage to what is necessary for performing work-related functions,” she said. “It has also enabled us to restrict mobile device usage from sites that are not work related. All of us have done it…we’ve unintentionally left our smartphone somewhere. There is sensitive data and contacts on these phones that we wouldn’t want out in the public. MDM gives us the ability to be able to lock down that phone anywhere at any time instantly if necessary.”
