Google Turns Back On Traditional Enterprise Mobility Security

Some 61,000 employees across the globe are using Google-powered mobile devices at the workplace, said Google, which outlined its approach to mobile security in a new white paper.

Reports Thursday (April 20) highlighted a company blog post by the tech conglomerate detailing the three tiers of enterprise mobility security Google deploys to safeguard those employees and employer data.

This tiered-access strategy means services and devices used within the enterprise are categorized into tiers to determine accessibility. Those tiers are determined based on the sensitivity of the data within that service or device. The second tier involves credential verification.

Google uses a variety of sources to capture as much data as possible about the devices in use within the enterprise, including operation system agents, asset management inventories and sources from within the device itself. That information is analyzed every time someone tries to access and use a particular device, reports explained.

“On successful user verification, access to services is granted only if the assessed risk profile of the device matches the required trust tier,” Google explained.

According to the company, this approach is not only more secure than traditional all-or-nothing access models, but is also more convenient for employees. Tiered access means the level of access and usability of a single device can change over time depending on who’s using it and for what purpose.

Google has fixed its vision on enterprise security in recent years. In February the company announced new security features for its range of enterprise apps in G Suite, enabling managers and administrators to have greater control over the data stored in these apps. Admin can control not only how employees use security keys to access a service on G Suite, but also who gets those keys.

The new features were announcing in conjunction with new research from Google, which concluded that the use of security keys is more effective than two-factor authentication at preventing hacks.