Trend Micro combined its own research with that commissioned from Altimeter Group and Bloor Research concerning the extent to which various mobile operating systems meet the needs of enterprise customers.

Not surprisingly, BlackBerry 7.0 gained the highest average score (2.89) across a vide range of factors  including built-in security, application security, authentication, device wipe, device firewall, and virtualisation. Although BlackBerry offers corporate-grade security and manageability, many of its advantages can be lost if devices are user-provisioned via BlackBerry Internet Services instead of being managed through BlackBerry Internet Server.

Apple's iOS 5 was a distant second (1.7), followed by Windows Phone 7.5 (1.61) and Android 2.3 (1.37).

The key advantages of iOS were said to be the application sandboxing, the absence of removable storage, and (in the BYOD context) the way an IT department can only configure items after the user has granted permission.

Similarly, the report notes Windows Phone's sandboxing with control over access to system features by applications, and that unsigned applications will not be run. In addition, where the hardware manufacturer makes provision for removable storage, the media is locked using a 128-bit key that ties it to the original phone.

What about Android? Please read on.

 

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The research focussed on Android 2.3 rather than 4.0 because the former is still the most widely used. "Security patches are provided to customers by individual carriers or handset manufacturers. There is an unacceptable delay in this process, meaning that many consumers remain unprotected from critical vulnerabilities for a prolonged period," the report notes.

Furthermore, "Android is currently the preferred platform by cybercriminals," with malware typically taking the form of Trojans.

Part of the problem is that although apps are granted permissions by the user. "Unfortunately the end user often fails to closely inspect the permissions request dialogue in their haste to use the app. It is often unclear, when permissions are given, what the application is actually capable of," Trend Micro officials observed.

One of the report's authors, Nigel Stanley, Bloor Research's practice leader - security, said "Security people I work with are scared witless by consumerisation and the rapid adoption of these devices. Aside from the technical challenges, organisations need to understand the importance of a decent mobile device security policy and supporting user education."

The report is available here [PDF, 1.3MB].