MWC16: Be Careful What You Wish For

Summary Bullets:

• The security versus privacy security is a growing threat to mobile operators, so they need to enter the debate to ensure customers continue to trust them.

• Success may be an even more pernicious problem, but the industry is showing its mettle in finding solutions.

As you read this, the madness and mayhem of MWC16 is winding down. But one of the key debates that will shape the future of the industry was taking place in the US between Apple, Google and Facebook, and the FBI. The issue is the balance between public security and personal privacy.

PII in the Sky – A Cloudy Outlook

Hugh Ujhazy

Summary Bullets:

• Asian governments are evolving their approach to managing PII data through legislative frameworks.
• Data privacy rules are converging across the region, but the onus for protection still rests squarely with the enterprise.

A fully realized cloud infrastructure promises server, storage and applications (along with all their data) floating in a glorious OpEx soup. Managed from afar, provisioned in minutes, flexible and scalable – there is little to dislike. However, for enterprises operating in multiple jurisdictions in Asia, data protection remains a key issue in planning deployments of cloud solutions.

When Worlds Collide: Augmented Reality Meets the Enterprise

Brad Shimmin

Summary Bullets:

• Microsoft, Google, Apple, Sony and other manufacturers are actively building wearable computers that will supposedly usher in the next step in human-computer interaction.
• Ready or not, when these reality augmenting devices will find their way into the enterprise, IT will have to deal not just with new hardware but more importantly with potentially litigious challenges in “human-human interaction.”

Yesterday the rumor mill began citing some rather convincing evidence that Microsoft was readying a new smart watch. That’s right, your shiny new tablet and smartphone are about to become history. The future of the human-computer interface isn’t fingers tapping on glass. As Google’s Sergey Brin showed us at the last Google IO conference, the sky is quite literally the limit when it comes to redefining how we interact with one another through the medium of technology. And they’re not alone. Sony has been working on a wearable computer (the Nextep) for some time now. Samsung and LG have as yet undisclosed projects in the works, and Apple has patented (no surprise there) a wearable computer with a curved screen.

Healthcare Inches Into the Cloud

Amy Larsen DeCarlo

Summary Bullets:

• Recent research on cloud use conducted by IT provider CDW found that just 35% of the healthcare IT professionals surveyed are either implementing or supporting cloud deployments today.
• Worries about security are keeping some health organizations on the sidelines; however, organizations in the industry are becoming increasingly receptive to the model, based at least in part on experience with on-demand storage and other services for personal use.

As adroit as the healthcare sector is when it comes to applying advanced medical technologies to improve diagnostics, treatments, and ultimately patient outcomes, the industry has a more awkward relationship with information technology in general and collaboration solutions in particular.  Though healthcare providers have often invested heavily in communications systems to streamline the information sharing process, many of these often proprietary implementations have fallen far short of expectations.  We can chalk some of the lackluster results to privacy and compliance issues that mandate organizations maintain tight control over information; however, there are also process and even cultural obstructions that are getting in the way of progress.

Look for Operators to Lead Cloud Ecosystems

Jerry Caron

Summary Bullets:

• Network operators are trusted sources in the consumer world; can this translate into the business world?
• There is an opportunity for operators to be leaders in the cloud services ecosystem given their technological position.

A recent, exhaustive, global study by Ericsson’s ConsumerLab research group indicates that – perhaps somewhat surprisingly – network operators are tops when it comes to trust.  The context is information privacy and data security, and the issue is what online companies such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Google, and all the others should be allowed to do with the information shared by the consumer in their application environments.