Mobile devices in government bring challenges of all sizes

Adding mobility to the federal government's tech lineup is an important step toward modernity. The enterprise world has realized the effectiveness of mobile devices, and the public sector is following along. According to GovWin, however, there have been some problems on the road to adoption.

The source stated that the dangers associated with losing a smartphone or tablet are magnified by association with the government. Access credentials to a secure corporate network could cause trouble if lost - in the case of a federal agency, national security could be at risk. The data on devices must be fully encrypted at all times, whether it's in transit or at rest.

Some of the risks and data problems associated with mobile devices, however, have nothing to do with security or device loss. The proliferation of new tablets could mean workers downloading and editing their own copies of files, creating many disparate records and data quality problems. The only way to fight back could be deduplication software.

Mobility rated several mentions in the official government technology policy. The document stated that mobile development will be a priority not only for internal federal applications but in customer-facing solutions using public sector data.