Companies may be getting confused over what is important.
Technology departments within businesses may be failing to deliver safe and effective services because they are focusing on the wrong issues.
This is according to top technologist Joe Baguley, speaking to Computing magazine at the Civica 2013 Conference in Manchester.
He said ‘bring your own device’ (BYOD) is "a bit of a misnomer", because it is not necessarily about people wanting to use their own tablets and smartphones.
"It’s actually more about the fact that people want access now to data and applications anywhere on any device. The real challenge is delivering data and applications to any device anywhere," Mr Baguley commented.
He also explained that he believes mobile device management (MDM) solutions focusing on applications or individual data siloes as "stop-gap technologies".
"We’ve seen several failed projects because everyone wants to own and manage devices," the expert said. "So there’s various stop-gap technologies stepping in to help people as their understanding evolves as to what they need to do. It’s the data you need to secure – and the access to that data."
It comes after a study carried out by Harris on behalf of Fiberlink found that 83 per cent of workers have concerns about their employer tracking them using MDM software.
Meanwhile, 86 per cent are worried that their personal information and possessions such as pictures, music and email profiles could end up getting deleted if they take part in BYOD and a further 82 per cent thought bosses may snoop on the websites they had been visiting.
Fiberlink president Christopher Clark suggested better security procedures may be necessary.
"Organisations need to be just as concerned about user privacy as they are about the security of corporate data," he added.
Dajon Data Management will be able to help with data security by carrying out a tailored assessment of company requirements and then implementing them with minimal disruption.