Security | Threat Detection | Cyberattacks | DevSecOps | Compliance

As businesses try to create a contactless experience amid the coronavirus pandemic, many have turned to QR codes. We’re seeing a lot of restaurants using them to display their menus on smartphones and on receipts for a contactless pay option. Within popular apps like Snapchat and WhatsApp, QR codes are an integral part of the user experience. Users can use codes to sign into their account, exchange contact information and make money transfer.

We are certainly in unique times, with COVID driving digital transformation at an unprecedented pace, remote work appearing to be long term, and the specter of new threats looming over security professionals as they strategized how to protect a rapidly changing business and tech landscape. To use perhaps one too many cliches: it is the best of times, it is the worst of times, the times are a changin’, and a change will do you good. No really, it will.

2020 has been a challenging year. Organizations had to quickly figure out how to secure employees and mobile endpoints working outside their existing perimeter-based controls. To take a step back, 2020 isn’t an anomaly. This shift to mobile-first was happening well before the pandemic.

It goes without saying that mobility has become the key to productivity for any modern business. This is especially true for the highly competitive pharmaceutical industry. To be the first to bring a ground-breaking treatment or vaccine to market, pharmaceutical organizations need their employees to stay productive whether they’re working on your organization’s premises or not.

A Government Business Council report from September of this year found 63% of federal employees are fully remote, with many expecting to remain that way for at least the next six months. In this new reality, mobile devices have become a critical lifeline. But the mobile phones and tablets that keep us efficient and effective also open our organizations up to new risks against which existing security does not defend.

In August 2020, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) released its strategy to ensure the security and resilience of 5G infrastructure in the United States. Roughly every 10 years, the next generation of mobile communication networks is released, bringing faster speeds and increased capabilities.