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ORLANDO, Fla. -- The state of California's staggering budgetproblems -- now an estimated $16 billion shortfall -- have putChris Cruz, deputy director and chief information officer at thestate's Department of Health Care Services (DHCS), in a toughsituation. Because of the state's ongoing fiscal crisis, he, likeother agency managers, last year was told to cut use ofstate-issued cellphones by 50% as a cost-saving measure. Cruzdecided one way to hold down costs at DHCS, which was usingBlackBerries, was to have agency employees use their own smartphones instead -- without any subsidy. This bring-your-own-device (BYOD) strategy has been controversial,pitting him against the state employee unions which are fighting itsince it effectively shifts device and service costs to employeeswho are not being given any stipend. Cruz acknowledges he alsofights over BYOD with his information- security officer, who thought it too risky. But if tough times call fortough measures, Cruz is not backing down, and says his strategy tomanage and secure the employee-owned smartphones is working. MORE: Gartner: Cloud-based mobile-device management (MDM) getting hot "As a Gen X guy," said Cruz, who spoke about his BYOD strategyduring this week's Gartner IT Infrastructure & ManagementSummit here, I was "looking at IT" not so much as a risk as an"opportunity." And that opportunity was a form of BYOD. "We had 1,500 BlackBerries," said Cruz, and he had to meet themandate set by the state last year to cut cellphone use by 50%.Each was costing $110 per month, he said, and "I wanted to get ridof them." Instead, DHCS, the large California healthcare agency whichsupports Medicaid and Medicare services, wouldn't buy newsmartphones, but ask employees to use their own smartphone for workpurposes. The employee using their personally owned device for workdata would have to agree to have the mobile device management (MDM)software that was selected, called Good Enterprise, installed ontheir mobile device so that DHCS would have the enforce policiesand the ability to wipe it if it were lost or stolen. The GoodTechnology software creates an "unbreakable partition" betweenpersonal and business data, Cruz pointed out. "DHCS mandated to have all mobile devices encrypted," Cruz said,adding encryption is something that's required and audited by theagency that's part of the U.S. Department of Health and HumanServices, called the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The information-security officer last year who initially objectedto the BYOD idea, thinking it too risky, had his job changed sothat he now reports directly to Cruz, who says he think the job ofsecurity staff is not to stop IT but to help mitigate risk. But Cruz hasn't been able to fend off the objections ofCalifornia's state-employee unions so easily -- they don't wantDHCS employees to have to bring their own phones. It may be "wecan't force rank-and-file employees to buy phones," Cruzacknowledges. Negotiations are ongoing, and it's not clear rightnow whether there will be a compromise or what it will be exactly. Because of ongoing negotiations with the unions over this, the DHCSBYOD plan isn't being made "mandatory" and is considered"voluntary" at this point, Cruz explained. But some users aregetting on board, and the department reckons it's eliminated about$400,000 in costs. "My goal is to eliminate mobile laptops over time," says Cruz,saying he expects to save about $1.6 million "by not refreshinglaptops." Instead, the Good Technology software might be loadedonto tablets like iPads. DHCS is also looking at using the CitrixXenDesktop virtualization technology as well. The idea is to allow workers more freedom to work from home if theyuse their own equipment. The department did look at providingstipends for employees, but decided "that contradicted the idea ofsaving money for the state," said Cruz. Other state CIOs, heacknowledges, weren't too keen on his agency's BYOD plan at thebeginning, but criticism may be softening. In fact, says Cruz, DHCSwon one of the "Best of California Technology Awards" last week for" Best Mobile/Wireless Project " from the Center for Digital Government . Ellen Messmer is senior editor at Network World, an IDG publicationand website, where she covers news and technology trends related toinformation security. Read more about anti-malware in Network World's Anti-malware section. I am an expert from hydropower-turbine.com, while we provides the quality product, such as China Hydraulic Power Generator , Axial Flow Pump Manufacturer, Francis Hydro Turbine,and more.
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