The Motorola Droid is about to get Android 2.2, a big step in the Android universe. With the new version of the operating system will come support for Flash, better security and presumably more stable operation.
The automatic update, which will start for the original Droid the week of 2 August, has been eagerly anticipated, but there’s still a lot that needs to be done if the Droid and its cousins are going to find a warm welcome in the enterprise. Don Reisinger has pointed out 10 issues that could derail Android’s early record of success, including the need for greater attention to privacy, security and support for enterprise users.
For many organisations, cameras are especially troublesome since they give users a way to quietly record documents or other intellectual property, or to compromise security. This is why you can buy a BlackBerry without a camera, for example.
There are other fairly glaring security failures as well. One of the really nice things about the Android family is that you can use applications that aren’t centrally controlled through an application store. This means that you don’t need to check with Google before developing a custom application for your Android device. In addition, Google is famous for being very open about the applications that it allows in its application store.
But the revelation that the company had to pull an application from its store that was funneling information to a site in China is enough to give enterprise security managers pause. Is it now necessary to buy malware detectors and antivirus software for your phone? Of course, they wonder the same thing about Google itself, which is famous for collecting data from Android phones for aggregation into its products.
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Our biggest enterprise gripe with Android is the inability to set a proxy when using WiFi. This effectively makes Android useless for many organizations. This is the #4 request on Google's Android forum, and people have been requesting/complaining about it for over a year, with no response, or even acknowledgment from anyone at Google.
@Bill: we use a proxy, Android works just fine; just use transparent. If you need to proxy more than web, try creating an APN for your wireless network.
@Wayne: factual corrections needed. For example it is not required to configure a Google account and you can synch contacts etc. on a per account basis anyway i.e. separate personal and business contacts. Google account is only needed if you want to use the Google App Market. Corporates can install software using their own internal repositories or from one of the alternative markets.
Further point: while it may not be possible to disable the camera, presumably the number of organisations searching their staff on the way in (to prevent digital cameras, personal mobiles coming in) can be counted in the 10s; so not exactly a key feature for enterprise.
Customer orientation: there is maybe an order of magnitude more customers in the consumer market than the enterprise one, and they are the ones driving Android development.
Maybe you should interview people who are using Android in the enterprise to get the alternative view?