Mobile lockdown coming to a phone near you

If keeping up with the security arms race isn't enough trouble on the desktop, CIOs will soon start to see increasing pressure to keep their mobile defences shored up.

Mobile operators will be leading the push, according to analysts, with 2007 likely to become the year the mobile networks debut their own mobile device management (MDM) services. A report from Visiongain predicts that by 2009, operator and enterprise MDM will be worth $1.3bn - and will grow dramatically after that.

According to Visiongain, the upsurge in data-centric devices means that sorting out device management services has become "critical" for the operators as they seek to switch consumers on to MDM - already a fixture in the corporate market.

Meanwhile, in the enterprise market, where MDM is well-established for wiping sensitive data from lost or stolen devices, CIOs may well be turning towards more advanced security measures for their mobiles.

A separate report from Juniper Research has found mobile security products, including antivirus, VPN, data and file encryption, and mobile identity management apps, will reach almost $5bn by 2011 - up from under $1bn last year.

Juniper predicts 247 million of us will be carrying a device with some sort of security measures installed on it, most of it likely to be from antivirus software.

Using biometrics to lock down phones will also begin to burgeon, growing to make up a $286m market by 2011.

Some operators are already beginning to wake up to the possibilities of mobile security. Orange recently signed up F-Secure to provide managed security for customers' mobiles. Nokia also sells its white-label MDM service to operators, while Motorola has picked up its own device management offerings with the acquisition of Symbol.