[raino]

How one startup is overhauling Android to make it enterprise-ready - Yahoo! News

I would prefer a stock OS deployment (like BBOS) vs. a modified OS, but I can see this taking off too if they market it aggressively and get the necessary certifications.

[tdawg00]

Pretty nice...

[bk1022]

This is predicated on the OS being intact. However, it goes to show you how betting on an open OS is the way to go these days. Waiting for a company like Apple, MS or RIM to get you where you need to be is quickly becoming an obsolete concept.

[DannyAves]

You also have hypervisors, or virtual machines, being released next year so one phone can even have two instances of the OS to give you a dual identity phone, one secure identity for work the other for personal.

from Dual-identity smartphones could bridge BYOD private, corporate divide

[lnichols]

You also have hypervisors, or virtual machines, being released next year so one phone can even have two instances of the OS to give you a dual identity phone, one secure identity for work the other for personal.

from Dual-identity smartphones could bridge BYOD private, corporate divide

The problem with this approach is you have two OS systems running at the same time sharing the resources of the phone, just like VM's in a server or desktop have to share resources, meaning the phone needs more resources to run both effectively.

[KermEd]

That's only true in a "one OS runs the other" environment. If truly split as a dualboot environment using the core as barebones to run the other, you would only see a 5-10 percent decrease jumping to mode #2.

If the second boot has a true bootloader etc though, HP Touchpad is a good example, then its a non-issue.

A true VM environment would be painful. I'd suspect we would see more integrated runtimes (like android on pb/bb10)

Sent from my BlackBerry 9360 using Tapatalk

[ffejrobins30]

You also have hypervisors, or virtual machines, being released next year so one phone can even have two instances of the OS to give you a dual identity phone, one secure identity for work the other for personal.

from Dual-identity smartphones could bridge BYOD private, corporate divide

You mean a lot like how BB10 will be out of the box come launch?

[dentynefire]

How does BB Balance differ from the section below, which seems overly complex in comparison.


ARM, and now AMD, are also working with the non-profit standards organization, GlobalPlatform, to develop the Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) API Specification. Founded in 1999, GlobalPlatform has its roots in the smartcard and payment market with member organizations such as Visa, MasterCard and American Express.

Using the ARM microcontroller on the x86 chip, the TEE would create a separate area on a mobile phone's main processor that uses data encryption algorithms to secure sensitive data stored on the device. Mobile capabilities already on smartphones would allow IT organizations to track mobile devices and erase only corporate data if the device is lost or compromised, or if the employee has left the company. For example, geo-sensor technology on smartphones would allow corporations to track where employee-owned mobile phones are and wipe the devices if they left a specified region.

"So, essentially this comes down to encryption key management. How do we protect the data from one operating system so that another operating system doesn't have access to it," Perez said. "The security processor would have that responsibility."

[mikeo007]

Am I the only nerd who thought this had something to do with the new Star Trek movie?
Attachment 127800

[bk1022]

the same os can be running twice and be managed by a hypervisor in a vmware style deployment. I disagree that it necessarily comes with a material degradation in performance. The hypervisor can effectively tell one of the instances to go to sleep. The assumption here is the hypervisor will be built specifically for the os on the phone and is not a third party product. As long as the hypervisor's job is simple, it can prevent one virtual machine from corrupting or accessing the other in any way.

this seems to me the only way you can guarantee the consumer instance of an os doesn't have trojans that eavesdrop on the corporate instance, for example.

The only real danger is location related data. You can't really protect malware from finding out your location unless you want to impair the phone in "consumer" mode.

[RECOOL]

And they say RIM will bring nothing new to the game haha thats why they already jumping on BB balance.More rips to come.

[notfanboy]

Am I the only nerd who thought this had something to do with the new Star Trek movie?
Attachment 127800

This is old news to Lt. Cmdr Data.

[raino]

Am I the only nerd who thought this had something to do with the new Star Trek movie?

You, sir, need to get with the (older) times. There is already an Android on the Enterprise, and his name is Data.

Back OT, I did not have BB Balance in mind when I read this article. This seems like a...simpler implementation ("rules"). In absence of these "rules" I'm wondering is the phone any ol' phone? That could be a problem, if, say, an employer has a GPS based rule, and someone tries to check their work email outside.

[kill_9]

the same os can be running twice and be managed by a hypervisor in a vmware style deployment. I disagree that it necessarily comes with a material degradation in performance. The hypervisor can effectively tell one of the instances to go to sleep. The assumption here is the hypervisor will be built specifically for the os on the phone and is not a third party product. As long as the hypervisor's job is simple, it can prevent one virtual machine from corrupting or accessing the other in any way.

You raise a valid point about segregation of the virtual machines on the smartphone. On the desktop and server I am using Oracle VirtualBox virtual machine instances when conducting investigations in which I want to completely isolate the specific virtual machine instance from the host operating system (no disk access outside the VM image, no network connectivity, no external device connectivity). The technology exists today but it needs to be "miniaturized" for the smartphone and/or tablet platforms.

[lnichols]

the same os can be running twice and be managed by a hypervisor in a vmware style deployment. I disagree that it necessarily comes with a material degradation in performance. The hypervisor can effectively tell one of the instances to go to sleep. The assumption here is the hypervisor will be built specifically for the os on the phone and is not a third party product. As long as the hypervisor's job is simple, it can prevent one virtual machine from corrupting or accessing the other in any way.

this seems to me the only way you can guarantee the consumer instance of an os doesn't have trojans that eavesdrop on the corporate instance, for example.

The only real danger is location related data. You can't really protect malware from finding out your location unless you want to impair the phone in "consumer" mode.

Have one instance go to sleep to save on resources!?!?! Isn't the point of a Dual Persona device to have both up and running so people aren't crippled on their device by work policies? I think the Balance solution is by far the most elegant solution shown so far. The work persona is always running, kept separate, and encrypted by the QNX micro kernel, and you can have your work information and personal information showing up in active frames side by side. I think once RIM gets Balance out in the field and businesses see it, they will demand that other devices get this type of near seamless functionality.