As agencies increasing rely on mobile devices and applications in conducting business, guidance is needed to streamline the secure adoption mobile technologies, the CIO Council has said in a report on mobile technology as it relates to the White House’s wider digital government strategy.
In a report exploring government use of mobile technology and looking at barriers, opportunities and assessing various shortcomings, the council recommended defining requirements for mobile device management and mobile application stores around various use cases.
These requirements would help reinforce mission-related use case selections and priorities, assist in procurement activities, and address the need for agencies to evaluate their pilots before making larger investments, CIO argued in its report.
It also called for the establishment of a cross-functional team to evaluate the technical, legal, privacy and other factors associated with the use of personal equipment.
The Council called for continued development of a mobile computing decision framework, and recommended the development of either a government-wide or agency policy and guidance to support more flexible use of commercial mobile devices.
Also needed is an acquisition strategy for procurement of mobile technologies that comply with government-wide policy, emerging standards and requirements, as well as continued development of requirements and recommendations to enable the use of strong authentication and encryption to accelerate the secure use of mobile devices.
