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The state of California's staggering budget problems -- now anestimated $16 billion shortfall -- have put Chris Cruz, deputydirector and chief information officer at the state's Department ofHealth Care Services (DHCS), in a tough situation. Because of thestate's ongoing fiscal crisis, he, like other agency managers, lastyear was told to cut use of state-issued cellphones by 50 percentas a cost-saving measure. Cruz decided one way to hold down costsat DHCS, which was using BlackBerries, was to have agency employeesuse 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. [ InfoWorld's Galen Gruman tells you h ow to turn an iPhone into a BlackBerry . Understand how to both manage and benefit from theconsumerization of IT with InfoWorld's "Consumerization Digital Spotlight" PDF special report . Subscribe to InfoWorld's Consumerization of IT newsletter today. ] 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 in Orlando, I was "looking at IT" not so much as a risk asan "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 50percent. Each was costing $110 per month, he said, and "I wanted toget rid of 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. The e-commerce company in China offers quality products such as Custom Shaped Balloons , Inflatable Helium Balloon, and more. For more , please visit Giant Advertising Balloon today!
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