As noted by many research firms and top experts, ISACA expects big data to emerge as a primary concern for IT and business in 2012. To meet that challenge, the IT educational and advocacy organization proposes the use of analytics across numerous projects, performance of ad hoc analysis to note areas of risk, and definition of success measures during big data project implementation.
"Big Data is going to evolve out of its ‘shiny new object’ status in 2012. IT leaders will need to figure out how to coax order out of the chaos from all those zeroes and ones, as well as optimize ROI and manage data privacy," said Ken Vander Wal, international president of ISACA, in a news release.
Use of mobile devices to access and deal with data is also anticipated by ISACA to continue its meteoric rise in the coming year, leading to the other two big trends in the information management field: the consumerization of IT and the proliferation of mobile BI.
Currently, “bring your own device” (BYOD) plans have not been holistically addressed to deal with the massive consumerization of IT, according to ISACA. In an ISACA survey, 16 percent of mobile business users stated their organization does not have a policy on personal activities with the devices, and another 20 percent were unaware of such a policy. It’s also different depending on geography: ISACA members in North America and Europe allow use of corporate IT assets for personal purposes to “promote work-life balance,” while those in Asia, Latin America and Africa are generally restricted from this due to security concerns. As more functionality arises from BYOD business intelligence, IT departments need to address who is accessing corporate information, at what times, and from what device, according to ISACA VP and CA Technologies executive Robert Stroud.
The new mobile landscape also means a whole host of new security threats and governance concerns, ISACA stated. To counter that, the industry group advises that information security managers create and communicate an easily understood and executable policy against data leaks and malware.
Justin Kern is senior editor at Information Management and can be reached at justin.kern@sourcemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter at @IMJustinKern.
