back to article Bring-your-own-mobe pilot for BlackBerry-shunning council bods

Cambridgeshire county council is to launch a bring your own device (BYOD) pilot, which will allow 50 employees to access corporate resources on their own gadgets. The local authority has restricted the BYOD trial to Android and Apple products to give its staff an alternative to GCSx compliant BlackBerrys. According to the …

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  1. jake Silver badge

    Can I bring my near 11 year old Nokia 5185?

    It still makes & receives telephone calls in Sonoma's so-called "dead zones". Surely that's good for something?

    Oh ... you mean that GUI stuff ... or that text stuff ... or that game stuff ... what the fuck does that have to do with making a fucking telephone call when it comes to Council business?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      in Cheshire west

      The give councillors a Blackberry, some councillors have MORE than one phone because they are deemed so important and now...

      They are angling to have ipads given to them for efficiency reasons.

      As they already get paid a minimum of £12,000 a year plus extras I think they too could buy their own.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        wait till it all goes wrong

        And they accidentally find all the accumulated porn on their personal devices......

    2. dotdavid
      Meh

      Re: Can I bring my near 11 year old Nokia 5185?

      Presumably your 5185 doesn't do secure email. Although I empathise with your stance that "normal phones" are often "good enough", some "GUI stuff" is actually quite useful.

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

      2. jake Silver badge

        Re: Can I bring my near 11 year old Nokia 5185?

        "Presumably your 5185 doesn't do secure email."

        My 5185 doesn't do any email. Nor does it need to. I have better tools at my disposal than a telephone for text-based communications.

        "Although I empathise with your stance that "normal phones" are often "good enough""

        For telephony, telephones are only needed for voice. By definition. Modern so-called "telephones" don't actually work here in large portions of Sonoma, Napa, Lake & Mendocino counties. So far, my old Nokia has managed to make & receive voice calls everywhere I've needed it to make and receive voice calls.

        "some "GUI stuff" is actually quite useful."

        Perhaps. I'm not convinced that I should allow hand-held batteries to be eaten in the name of marketing. YMMV, of course.

        And once again, I get back to the fact that I want a telephone to be a telephone. Nothing more, nothing less.

        1. Andy ORourke
          Happy

          Re: Can I bring my near 11 year old Nokia 5185?

          Jake, you seem to have found the perfect phone for your requirements and I'm happy for you.

          Please remember that other people might like to do other things (like email) without having to boot up the laptop.

          OK, we know they just like the latest shiny shiny but If an organisation can reduce costs by getting users to provide their own (shiny) kit then that's a good thing right? (assuming of course it can be done in a secure manner)

          Please, just because you are in Nirvana with your own technological solutions, dont berate anyone who doesnt do it your way

          Peace man...

        2. Wize

          Re: Can I bring my near 11 year old Nokia 5185?

          "And once again, I get back to the fact that I want a telephone to be a telephone. Nothing more, nothing less."

          Does that include being wired to a land line? After all, thats a 'normal phone.'

          Oh, but wait, you want it to do something more. Like be portable. No you can't have that because someone else wants phones just to be wired devices.

          And you can't ever be connected to the internet either. Your home and work connection is via phone lines. And phone lines are for voice only.

          You want something more than a device tethered to a wire. Other people want more than being tethered to a voice only device.

          No one is forcing you to surf the internet on a pocket device.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    " And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example"

    Really? I can't think of a worse device for corporate use?

    Didn't LG have a phone that did visualization on Android that allowed a work partition and a personal partition? Of course all Androids support remote wipe if they get lost or stolen.

    Our work, we unfortunately have to suffer Lotus Notes for corporate mail and scheduling, however it's web based client is quite good (despite everything else being a steaming turd). And the web client works great on my Xperia Arc S using Opera. it's fast and easy to see my calendar and mail, and there is of course a proper Android client too. I don't believe either of these store data locally (if you use Opera in private mode).

    1. DrXym

      Re: " And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example"

      I would have thought enterprises would like devices which are serviceable, repurposeable, can be secured / locked down and are relatively rugged. I don't see how an iPad would qualify as any of those things. There's a killing to be made for whoever produces something which fits the bill.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: " And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example"

      > Didn't LG have a phone that did visualization on Android that allowed a work partition and a personal partition?

      Yes, one model on Verizon LTE, not much use for BYO here in the UK then.

      > Of course all Android support remote wipe if they get lost or stolen.

      So do all iOS devices. iPhones and iPads also support hardware device encryption, something that only Android 4 phones (less than 2%) have.

      1. Mike Judge
        FAIL

        Re: " And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example"

        My Android 3 device has dull hardware encryption....

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Thumb Down

          Re: " And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example"

          Android 3 doesn't run on phones... only tablets.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: " And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example"

      "Our work, we unfortunately have to suffer Lotus Notes for corporate mail"

      hahahahahahahahahahahaha

      Did you just get upgraded to 8.5?

  3. James 51
    FAIL

    "And sometimes people have a considerably better device like iPhones and iPads, for example,"

    Opinons, everyone has got one.

  4. Doug 14
    Pint

    Support Your Own Device

    No particular object to a BYOD policy; asl long as it is accompanied by an SYOD policy.

  5. Pete 2 Silver badge

    Show me the money

    I'd only want to risk using my own equipment at work if it made me more productive. Even then, I'd expect my employer to cover the cost of that risk: loss, damage, wear & tear - 'cos business use sure as hell isn't covered by my home contents insurance.

    Further, it also appears that I'd be subsidising the company by not having them fork out for the tools necessary for my job.

    So we have a situation where I'm doing more and/or better work, paying for the kit myself and bearing the risk if a co-irker makes off with it. Unless I see some hard cash (net of tax) to make up for all these benefits the company gets, I really don't feel the need to give away all that free stuff. Especially considering the pay rises over the past few years.

    1. Sean Timarco Baggaley

      Re: Show me the money

      @Pete 2: If you're using your own device for work, its purchase could well be tax deductible.

      I agree with your sentiment on the one hand. On the other hand, IT admins tend to have a "one size fits all" attitude towards employee equipment: everyone gets the same Dell kit, regardless of whether they're a graphic designer working for Marketing, or a spreadsheet wrangler down the corridor in Accounting.

      This same attitude is why so many employees have been saddled with ageing BlackBerry devices. It's what the IT folks like, because it makes _their_ lives easier, as opposed to making the rest of the company's employees lives easier. Naturally, the IT Admin team's requirements trump those over every bugger else. (And then they wonder why everybody else treats them so badly.)

      1. Paw Bokenfohr
        Stop

        Re: Show me the money

        @Sean Timarco Baggaley

        It's been my experience that it's not the "IT Admins team" that decides on the hardware or software to deploy, and if it were, they wouldn't be deploying Dell or Blackberry.

  6. LawLessLessLaw
    Boffin

    These are people with access to RIPA

    Making these phones a *very* attractive target.

    One "sandbox" app across two platforms. Yeah, that sounds like an excellent idea.

    Sandboxes, pfft, they work great on compromised devices.

    Still, no less secure than whatever shitty Dell is going to be running at their homes.

  7. Khaptain Silver badge
    Devil

    News Headline : Work related incidents on the rise

    If your telephones falls and breaks at work, who will be reponsable for replacing it ? The employee or the employer.

    If it is the employer : see title.

    If it is the employee : then weep cause you are only a bod anyway.....

    1. J. Taylor

      Re: News Headline : Work related incidents on the rise

      Where I work we do support for corporate mobiles, as a rule, If we have an invoice for it, we will support/replace it, if we don't we'll do our best but you're on your own.

  8. Crisp
    Stop

    I don't think that this is a good idea.

    I'm not sure that I like the idea of council employees wandering around with tax payers data on their own devices.

    Is it me? Or does that seem incredibly dodgy?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I don't think that this is a good idea.

      Who pays the line rental?

      with most BB you get free landline calls, what happens to the call volumes?

      If joe bloggs signs up for an all singing plan, gets fired in 2 months, who pays the contract off?

      1. Matthew 3

        Re: I don't think that this is a good idea.

        Surely you'd claim work usage back through expenses? And if you're fired after two months it's no problem. Well, not for the employer, anyway.

        You might find it's a bit more trouble getting your claims signed off though.

  9. jaycee331
    FAIL

    Oh dear...

    I just don't agree with consumerisation at all. The security issues are to me far too great and the whole thing is an unnecessary security risk. Other than pampering to gen-x and their lust for all things shiny, I see no good sane reason why a company would go down this road, unless, as I fear, they are just following the latest industry hype-mongering about this being the next big thing.

    So take note of this from me any UK biz reading this, thinking of following the herd. If I hear you are backing consumerisation, I will take that as meaning that you don't take information security seriously. Because if you did, you would stick to the closed, controlled corporate device model and stop pandering to whims like this which I doubt have any direct business benefit at all. Surely the on-going management overhead for these security overlay solutions and risk management will outweigh the use of someone's phone for free.

    And, if they did do any prroper research before coming out with this brain fart of an idea, they'd have understood there are complex legal matters in terms of employee/employer liability, the majority of which remains unclear, unproven and untested. And most likely, not catered for, or understood, at all.

    I don't really understand where consumerisation came from originally and why, but I strongly suspect it's so the VIP's can find something to use their shiny iPad's for.

  10. Slim

    Where to start?

    As Crisp said, the fact that council employee's will be walking around with tax payers information on their own personal devices, which as much security as active sync can now give, you can't get it to tell the device to block USB access to every computer but the office machines.

    Then there are the unhappy council workers, which realise later rather then sooner that as part of this BYOD, they probably won't be compensated for their own personal phones having to download all their emails and attachments.

    To be honest, I don't think any the people who complained about wanting to use their own personal phones for their work emails have realised that it's a bad idea for a bigger reason. By having their work emails connected to their own phones, this means they will make themselves pretty much obtainable 24/7. Yes, alright you can turn your phone off when you leave work...but then what's the point of having a personal phone that you only use in work time? How many people will actually know/be bothered to turn their emails off after 5pm? You might not respond to your emails after 5pm but how many people read their emails when they first come in, just to see if it was something important you were waiting for?

    Personally, I think the work phone is the way to go. It's the perfect way of stepping away from your work life and getting on with your personal life because you can turn it off and put it in a draw when you’re on holiday!

    Anyone who complains that having to "lug around two mobiles" is a difficult task, man up and stop buying stupid clothes without pockets for work clothes. Phones are not that big and do not weight that much, I’m not asking you to carry around a lead brick in your pocket.

    Finally for those who complain that they'd rather have an android or an iphone instead of a blackberry, grow up and be thankful that you've even been given phone for work. My company gave my an iphone (when I’d have rather had a can with a bit of string on the end) but just get over it and work with what your given.

  11. ChrisM

    I'm sure all those who sign up for this will have signed up to a corporate tariff

    if not wouldn't they have broken their providers TOS?

  12. gaz 7
    Stop

    Would you every stop working though?

    My own mobile (Nokia N900 btw) is considerably more powerful than the basic blackberry I have as a work device which does not even have 3G, and I could if it were permitted RDP onto the servers and do all sorts of admin work from just about anywhere.

    But, and it's a massive but for me, when would work ever stop? If I've had a rough day, I can turn the BB off, and not power up the laptop. If I use my own device that's not an option.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "If joe bloggs signs up for an all singing plan, gets fired in 2 months, who pays the contract off?"

    We are talking about the public sector here - no-one gets fired.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "I'm not sure that I like the idea of council employees wandering around with tax payers data on their own devices.

    Is it me? Or does that seem incredibly dodgy?"

    No worse than them carrying it round on an unencrypted USB stick or laptop?

    At least most mobiles can be remote wiped.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "And once again, I get back to the fact that I want a telephone to be a telephone. Nothing more, nothing less."

    Fine and perhaps you also like to light your house with candles - but the world is moving on. Calls are very intrusive - so I would rather people IM / SMS / email me - if it's urgent then call - but otherwise I would prefer not to be disturbed with a call. So equally you can argue technology can make your work 'better'...?

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @AC 12.03 - IM / SMS

    Glad someone out there finds unified comms (IM et all) a better way of working.

    I don't, I can't frigging stand it, and for me is just more technology for the sake of it.

    Use of IM is rife at my employer. It is soooo inpersonal; I would prefer a phone call any day. It is also highly disruptive and intrusive. If the phone rings I can choose to let it wait a few seconds to finish what I'm doing before picking it up. Or if it's a really bad time it can go to VM. IM? Bang, instant pop-up in my face, instantly distracting and changing focus from whatever I might have been in deep concentration on. The sender will then sit there expecting an instant reply too. Yeah I could micro-manage my status into DnD for an hour but then that's just become an overhead.

    If the idea is that IM is quicker and more efficient than a phone call, I would suggest that the efficiency comes at a cost - removing banter, chit-chat and general knowledge sharing from speaking to people on the phone. I work in an IM obsessed team and so many basic knowledge functions are flawed because people have had this nonsense beat into them that it's not "cool" to pick up the phone anymore, so no-one really talks to each other properly anymore, causing real and tangible knowledge gaps and poor communication. From a tool that's supposed to improve communication, lolz.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: @AC 12.03 - IM / SMS

      What are you using????

      We use unified comms extensively, in fact, all desk phones have been removed as they are redundant (debatable, but so far it's working).

      Doesn't matter where in the country anyone is working, you use the same method to call them. And that is call, same as a phone, only easier. No numbers to remember, use their names. And using a USB headset frees up both hands to type at the same time. And it's much easier to see the status of the person you want to call and avoid ringing and ringing someone who is on holiday, in a meeting or already on a call. Conference calls in seconds, video calls too.

      Someone sends an IM, a pop up appears for a second or two, no focus change, no more intrusive than an email notification.

      Changing status? Right click in system tray, change status.. busy...not that difficult to do.

      Throw in web-based client and mobile apps, everything in one place.

  17. Why Not?
    WTF?

    Oh non standard hardware - deja vu anyone?

    Having spent years getting all users on a limited subset of hardware so you have all the spares, tips & tricks documented etc we are going back to a free for all.

    IT are going to have to supply 50 different chargers when the executives forget theirs. Remember all the pecularities of each machine etc.

    Worse you are going to have to explain why PHB1's laptop only lasts an hour when PHB2's lasts 70 minutes. Then having changed the power settings to eek another 3 minutes out of the battery you spend 3 hours fixing the virus infested pile of manure PHB1 uses because you were the last person to touch it (aprt from PHB1's eldest son who has an interesting choice in videos).

    To top it all you can't report them to HR because its their own PC.

    There was a reason to standardise, having tried 'wild west IT' I much prefer corporate standards for support.

    It will be IT's fault when their PC with a list of all secret agents in Europe is stolen on the train and its found with a post it note with the password on. They will want to claim for it because it was stolen on work business etc...

    Train crash in motion.

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