IT teams are at a disadvantage when diagnosing and resolving technology challenges.
Despite allowing organizations to remain operational during the pandemic, remote working has also brought about a number of challenges – many of which revolve around security.
According to a new report from mobile security firm NetMotion, the vast majority of remote workers (62 percent) are guilty of using Shadow IT, with some of them (25 percent) using a “significant number” of unapproved tools.
Shadow IT, which describes the use of unauthorized software by employees, poses a significant security threat to organizations. These tools could result in sensitive data falling into the wrong hands, or malware and ransomware getting into the company network via unsecured endpoints.
The Netmotion report explains that not only do employees use Shadow IT en masse, but they are also aware that their IT teams lack visibility into endpoints, connectivity and application performance. As a result, in many instances, employees decide not to report any of the issues they’re having to their IT teams.
Surveying 500 IT professionals and 500 employees who shifted to remote working in the US and UK, NetMotion found almost half (45 percent) of remote workers understand their IT department values employee feedback. However, a quarter (26 percent) of employees said they didn’t feel that their feedback would change anything, and almost a third (29 percent) were undecided.
“Sadly, our research showed that nearly a quarter of remote workers would rather suffer in silence than engage tech teams,” said Christopher Kenessey, CEO of NetMotion.
“Without dedicated tools to monitor the experience of remote and mobile workers, IT teams are at a disadvantage when diagnosing and resolving technology challenges, and that’s putting greater strain on the IT-business relationship.”
