Trend Micro has released the results of its study on the four main mobile operating systems in a report titled “Enterprise Readiness of Consumer Mobile Platforms”.
The security firm found the BlackBerry 7 OS the most secure mobile operating system, followed by iOS 5, Windows Phone 7.5, and Android 2.3.
Summary chart from “Enterprise Readiness of Consumer Mobile Platforms” White Paper by Trend Micro.
Android 2.3 was used in the study because it was the dominant installed/supplied version of Google’s mobile OS at the time of the research.
Below is an excerpt from the White Paper summarising the findings about the four mobile platforms.
BLACKBERRY OS
When it comes to individual platforms, the experts’ analysis clearly points out that some operating systems are more mature than others. BlackBerry OS scores very highly across the board, clearly separated from the group of the three emerging consumer mobile platforms. Corporate-grade security and manageability make this platform the option of choice for the most stringent mobile roles.
APPLE iOS
Now at its fifth iteration, the leading challenger is Apple iOS. Apple’s proprietary approach has become more enterprise-friendly: the strict control exerted by Apple on the overall ecosystem—from hardware to operating system to applications—makes this platform more secure and manageable in the consumer mobile segment.
However, in contrast to RIM’s fully integrated approach, the back-end components required to secure and manage Apple mobile devices are not provided directly by Apple but by a multitude of third-party vendors usually positioned in the Mobile Device Management segment. When complemented by third-party infrastructure, Apple iOS security and manageability are already good enough to be considered for mobility roles requiring device encryption and policy control.
ANDROID
Despite its impressive market performance, Android security and manageability are the lowest in the segment. The Google Android operating system is at its fourth commercial iteration and has recently seen some important security additions, such as device encryption support, however good Mobile Device Management APIs and a reliable control of the overall operating system versioning and application ecosystem are still conspicuous by their absence.
The system is widely exposed to malware and data loss, and the platform fragmentation resulting from the rich OEM ecosystem has proved quite challenging for enterprise adoption. IT managers should definitely consider adding Android to their set of flexible policies but should probably limit its use to the least sensitive mobile roles.
WINDOWS PHONE
Although last to enter this segment, Microsoft Windows Phone performs quite well across the board especially considering that version 7.5 has only been out for less than 18 months. The system is too new to show a reasonable track record for enterprise adoption, and corporate policies should take this reality into consideration when considering Windows Phone devices for mobile roles other than for general knowledge workers.
– Excerpt from “Enterprise Readiness of Consumer Mobile Platforms” by Trend Micro (11 April 2012).
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