How to Fix the Cybersecurity Blind Spot That Is Shadow IT

May 23, 2016
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2 min read

Can You Uncover Your Blind Spot?

I don’t know about you, but I love the new blind spot warning system on cars. Originally, it was the tiny convex mirrors that my mom made me install on my side-view mirrors, which sort of helped; now, it’s visual indicators that flash a nifty little light in my mirror if another car is in my blind spot. Wouldn’t it be great to have that everywhere in life?

I thought about that the other day when out shopping and came mere inches from spinning my cart into a small child who had darted out of an aisle behind me. I can only imagine the calamity that would have ensued, from explaining how I didn’t see little Sammy to clarifying how he ended up in a heap on the ground.

Today’s enterprise faces a number of similar blind-spot challenges involving shadow IT and mobile users. Taking advantage of technology that can help protect against the hard-to-see threats makes perfect sense.

The Typical Security Challenges

Here are four examples of challenges that the average enterprise IT department may encounter.

Challenge: How do I discover and eliminate shadow IT, even on mobile devices?
Answer: Identify which applications are of the highest risk to your organization and eliminate those applications through mobile device management (MDM) or corporate IT usage policies.

Challenge: How can I leverage existing technology to reduce costs for the company?
Answer: Seamless integration of your cloud access security broker (CASB) solution into your SIEM console helps your organization speed cloud adoption without risking IT governance and control.

Challenge: How can I mitigate risk from noncompliance with regulations and security?
Answer: Secure your corporate information and prevent data leakage by understanding what applications are in use on your employees’ mobile devices, and which of those applications present the highest risk. In addition, you need to gain visibility over your riskiest users and the rogue apps they are accessing.

Challenge: Why do I have to spend additional money and time to integrate vendor products?
Answer: Solutions such as IBM’s network of threat intelligence products offer unparalleled expertise, delivering both knowledge and product solutions that offer seamless integration into existing investments.

Sean Brown
Senior Offering Manager, IBM Security

Sean has been a technology leader for IBM for the past 11 years, with extensive experience in both security and collaboration solutions. Currently, he is par...
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