2023 Federal Tech Trends: Device Lifecycle Management Is Helping with Compliance - FedTech Magazine

Federal bureau IT leaders indispensable equip employees for success, careless of wherever they are working, whether that’s astatine headquarters, astatine location oregon connected the road.

They indispensable bash truthful portion securing the agency’s accusation crossed an ever-expanding scope of devices — desktops, laptops, tablets, smartphones, the occasional augmented world headset — for arsenic agelong arsenic they are successful service. Add a dizzying fig of BYOD mobile devices, and IT teams person their hands full.

If agencies are incapable to support way of their devices, they simply cannot guarantee the information of their accusation oregon support regulatory compliance. The task tin beryllium overwhelming.

“There are truthful galore things you person to comply with, and they support coming each the time,” says Sean Frazier, national main information serviceman astatine Okta. “You tin get compliance fatigue erstwhile you look astatine each the things that exist.”

Frazier names a fewer to exemplify his point:

• President Joe Biden’s May 2021 enforcement order, which evolved into an official national cybersecurity strategy, has accrued the government’s absorption connected zero-trust compliance.
• Lawmakers are looking to betterment the Federal Information Security Modernization Act of 2014, oregon FISMA, which governs agencies’ cybersecurity policies.
• Biden signed the FedRAMP Authorization Act successful December 2022, codifying the 2011 Federal Risk Authorization Management Program into instrumentality and establishing authoritative oversight of unreality information for national agencies.
• The National Institute of Standards and Technology’s Special Publication 800-53 details the cybersecurity controls that agencies tin use.
• The Defense Department revamped its Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification program successful November 2021 to streamline the process of handling controlled unclassified information.

Compliance dictates what national agencies indispensable bash and however to bash it, but it besides tin usher IT leaders connected the astir captious exertion elements requiring care.

Establish a Holistic View of All Devices

Device lifecycle absorption helps agencies by cataloging infinitesimal details of each instrumentality successful the agency’s environment. Device lifecycle absorption besides tin beryllium portion of a larger IT plus absorption strategy that involves bundle and networking equipment.

It is simply a cardinal instrumentality for IT leaders to cognize wherever each instrumentality is successful its lifecycle and erstwhile it mightiness beryllium clip to refresh oregon discontinue the asset.

As acold arsenic compliance is concerned, instrumentality lifecycle absorption is simply a mode for IT leaders to cognize wherever the agency’s accusation lives and however it’s secured.

“One of the biggest things is taking information into relationship successful the full lifecycle,” Frazier says. “We inactive deliberation of things arsenic unafraid aft the fact. We enactment it retired determination and oh, by the way, let’s marque it secure. We can’t bash that.

“As IT leaders, we person to beryllium reasoning for everything we build, from the clip that we person it arsenic a thought successful our brain, we should beryllium readying what the information is for that architecture,” helium says. “We person to beryllium reasoning astir the security implications.”

Conversations connected instrumentality lifecycles often revolve astir bundle because, arsenic Frazier notes, “device lifecycle is bundle lifecycle,” and keeping some up to day is “a never-ending prospect.”

Process and argumentation are foundational to IT plus management, write David Comings and Randi Coughlin of CDW successful a blog post. “They tin guarantee that unapproved oregon malicious downloads are discovered connected the web and assistance automate information and compliance practices.”

EXPLORE: Federal agencies pb different industries successful zero-trust adoption.

Consider the Costs of Managing Devices

Finances tin beryllium a limiting origin erstwhile establishing a instrumentality lifecycle absorption system. The bureau indispensable see the outgo of acquiring caller devices and the outgo of managing them, including efforts to maintain security and compliance.

On 1 hand, keeping devices successful usage for a longer clip lowers the wide outgo of ownership, but it extends the vigor and resources of the IT squad to negociate them.

“The longer you’re hanging connected to devices, the much types of things you’re apt to beryllium supporting — the much varieties of desktop models oregon laptop models, the much and antithetic quality of cellphone platforms and operating strategy versions. And each clip you’re dealing with that, you summation the complexity of what you’re managing,” says Scott Buchholz, CTO for Deloitte’s authorities and nationalist services practice.

“Who’s going to negociate them? Is it the aforesaid radical if it’s a desktop oregon a laptop arsenic it is for a telephone oregon a tablet?” Buchholz continues. “That tin beryllium a existent pain, due to the fact that it’s not conscionable keeping things up to day connected them, but it’s besides fixing them erstwhile they break, servicing them and truthful forth.”

On the different hand, limiting the lifecycle of devices volition constrictive however overmuch clip the IT squad spends managing those devices, but it tin thrust up costs arsenic devices are refreshed much frequently.

“How important is it that an worker has a laptop that’s nary much than 2 oregon 3 years old? Does it substance if it’s five?” Buchholz says. “What is the worth of owning the hardware and maintaining the hardware versus fundamentally leasing the hardware for a play of time, knowing that they are depreciating assets, knowing that the refreshed lifecycles are what they are?

“That’s the situation of leadership: making definite you’re balancing the pros and cons of those antithetic areas,” helium says.

Click the banner below to get Insider entree to exclusive articles astir national IT trends.

Get Help Managing Device Lifecycles

Some agencies person the resources to negociate devices connected their own. For others, working with a trusted partner tin assistance IT leaders with the process, keeping devices up to day and shoring up compliance. CDW, for example, tin supply enactment passim the 4 pillars of the instrumentality lifecycle: observe and design, deploy, manage, and refresh and recover. Amanda Zusman, a programme manager successful CDW’s merchandise and spouse absorption practice, details however that tin happen.

LEARN ABOUT: The 4 pillars of modern workspace management.

Discover and design: Agencies get assistance purchasing devices, including identifying their objectives and mapping retired a way to execute them.

Deploy: Agencies enactment with a spouse to deploy devices much efficiently and cost-effectively, including imaging, configuration and inventory staging.

Manage: Agencies person assistance successful seamlessly managing devices, enhancing security, collaborating and optimizing applications.

Refresh and recover: Agencies person enactment successful retiring, redeploying and recycling devices.

Having a spouse managing an organization’s devices and ensuring their information passim their lifecycle frees IT teams to absorption connected much invaluable work, Zusman writes.