Proactively addressing home and office PC security

Webroot’s extensive survey – over 2500 respondents that was summarized in a Sept 20th press release – reinforced the need for businesses to recognize the inevitable blurring between personal and professional computing. With anti-malware scanning and filtering shifting to the cloud it is easier for organizations to proactively help secure home PCs as well as those in the office. Vendors can do their part by providing services that makes it easy for users or IT to manage security policy for multiple devices - inside and outside of the office.

What caught my eye in the Webroot study was that more than 40% of respondents purchased non-work related items online. Combined with prior results that 46% of users visit their favorite social networking site several times a day, it is becoming clear that employees don’t think twice about blurring personal and professional browsing while in the office. That is not a real surprise, since hundreds of millions of users have been blurring the distinction between personal and professional computing while at home to read business mail, or connect to desktops via VPNs or products like GoToMyPC. And that does not even factor in the use of mobile devices which completely bypass corporate security. Security teams need to address home security for home computing.

Businesses can help by negotiating coverage of home computers in their anti-virus agreements, evaluating cloud-based endpoint security management that bridges the home and the office, or recommending to employees the best free anti-malware offerings (sometimes available from service providers). There is a train of thought that there should be a clear separation of duties between personal and professional devices, and it is up to the employee to shell out $50 per PC annually to help protect the business. But that train is leaving the station.