Shadow IT is when an employee of a company does something like contracting with an outside provider of technology services or hardware without talking with the MSP or in-house IT first. For example, if the organization uses Office 365 but a manger decides to sign-up for Google Doc’s for their department and doesn’t inform their IT personnel first, this is considered a form of Shadow IT.
Some of the various aspects of Shadow IT may include:
Hardware: When team members bring in their own devices or hardware that is not first cleared with the IT department. This may include laptop’s, phones, tablets, or other various electronics which may access the corporate network.
Software: As mentioned earlier, when a member of the organization be it a department manager, or a base level employee, uses software not cleared by the internal IT group, this is considered Shadow IT and can result in serious security breaches. Software may include forms of email clients, 3rd party production software, or unsecure web browsers and the like.
Online Services: Individual employee’s or team members who use outside internet services such as 3rd party VPN clients, or 3rd party backup software for example are also considered uses of Shadow IT. It is important to always clear 3rd party online services with the IT department to ensure security best practices are met.
What Are the Concerns with Shadow IT
There are serious security gaps that are formed when an IT department doesn’t know what services and application are being adopted. “App sprawl”, lost time and money, and communication failures and inefficiencies are some of the most common problems that come from working with Shadow IT.
When working with applications and services that are not centralized with an IT, software that is introduced to workstations or servers may pose security risks or create conflicts which could jeopardize the usability of other software.
Shadow IT usage may require the ability for network level access. This could endanger your corporate network security, since it’s impossible for the IT department to monitor and maintain the security needs of the Shadow IT operations devices accessing the network-based applications that are deployed.
Best practices are to always work within the scope of one single IT department, or managed services provider. Even small or home-based offices can benefit from an official IT department role, rather than relying on outside Shadow IT operations.
Managed Services Providers like Natural Networks has the unique ability to serve as the IT department for businesses from small and medium sized ventures to large corporate offices. Centralizing and handling all aspects of your IT all under one umbrella. This eliminates the need for costly internal IT departments, while maintaining the IT security and needs of the business.
If you want to learn more about how a Managed IT services company can help with your IT goals, give us a call today!
