Differentiating mobile devices

Disclaimer: These be the thoughts and ramblings of the author, not necessarily those of his employer, management or any other fellow lackies.

When company management seeks to differentiate between devices and attempt to ban certain categories of device from the workplace they can often fail to realize that categories have merged and cannot easily be separated.

Apple mobile devices, for instance, all run the same operating system and apps So banning IPad tablets but not IPhones does nothing from a security, capability or risk standpoint. The same apps and capabilities exist on the phones as the tablets.

In fact, phone calls can be made from an iPad using google voice to any landline, so would that not make an iPad fit into the phone category?

If you say no then would you be classifying the IPad as a tablet on a mere size basis ?

Phones are getting bigger. The galaxy note 2 phone is 5.5 inches. The new iPad mini is only 7.8 inches and has a cellular radio option available. The ipod touch is only 4 inches but has no cellular radio. Which is a phone and which is a tablet ?

I would argue that the whole phone / tablet differentiation is bogus as tablets can have the same operating system , hardware and uses as a phone.

Trying to restrict tablet use only serves to alienate a subset of workers and show managements lack of a true understanding of modern mobile devices.

S. Russell Dyer BS CNE CISSP CRISC Security+ CICP
Mobile device Guru.