Avid Systems and Air Force Partner to Deliver the first of a kind BYOAD Solution

    WASHINGTON, DC, September 10, 2020 /24-7PressRelease/ -- The BYOAD solution is a cost-effective and value-driven mobility platform that allows airmen to access government data and applications from their personal smartphones and tablets in a secure manner without infringing on the user's right to privacy. It is the first BYOAD solution that meets the Department of Defense (DoD) stringent requirements. For the first time in the history of the Air Force, Avid Systems, in conjunction with USAF and DISA, extended the USAF's network to an IL5 cloud Software as a Services (SaaS) platform. In addition to the technology advantages, the Avid Systems solution provides USAF with a cost-efficient payment model.

Rather than paying for large amounts of licenses up front, the BYOAD solution enables the Air Force to pay in the rears only for the actual live BYOAD users. This drives value for the Air Force and helps ensure Avid Systems and all their partners are delivering a capability that the users want. Together with the proven benefits of the BYOAD approach (reduced expenses on hardware, telecommunications, support, and training), it is expected that the USAF operational costs will be reduced by a minimum of 25 percent.

The BYOAD solution enables users to work remotely and provide access to government information from anywhere, at any time via their own personal devices. After about 15-minutes of effort to register and provision, the users get access to a full range of tools that tie into the USAF's backend infrastructure, enabling the user to send and receive emails, access Internal USAF websites and web applications, access SharePoint Online and OneDrive repositories, and digitally sign PDF forms with certificate-based credentials.

To streamline the user registration and enrollment process, Avid Systems developed a custom self-service portal that provides automated user approval workflows, reporting, training, and help desk access. The new self-service registration process has cut down the registration and enrollment time down to 15 minutes.

The delivered solution:
• Protects government data and the user's right to privacy
• Maintains insight and protection against device level vulnerabilities
• Empowers and enables the user
• Provides flexibility to support USAF's mission as it evolves
• Ensures the cost model is value-driven and not task-driven

The central idea of the solution development was the application-centric security approach. It ensures that personal information is not visible to the Government while protecting the corporate data from the device level vulnerabilities such as zero-day attacks, jailbreaking, phishing attacks, and others.

With the BYOAD container-centric approach, sensitive government information is never stored in the device's native keystore, as a result, it is not necessary to wipe or destroy the device if a data spillage occurs. Third-party PEN testing has proven that deleting the government application that was built with the container-centric deployment approach removes all government data.

In addition, the solution has Mobile Threat Detection (MTD) and Mobile threat Prevention (MTP) software that provides protection from multiple risks including, malicious content, rogue Wi-Fi, data leak, viruses, access control violation, and many others.

"The need to telework across the force drove capability growth for our program and others out there," Mr. Eric Lubeck, Air Force BYOAD Program Manager, said at the annual AFITC conference last week. Mr. Lubeck also added "We don't care what websites you visit, we don't care what apps you have on your personal phone, but if you were to go to a site that downloaded malicious things on your phone, or you downloaded an app that had the ability to steal credentials off your phone, we as an Air Force would be concerned about those types of things. That's what the security tools provide: the ability to securely manage that separation between what's on the personal side of the phone and what's on the government side of the phone."

"We wanted to deliver the solution that solves the BYOAD security challenges both for government agency and employees," said Esther Lazar, CEO, Avid Systems. "We are pleased to work with a customer that strives to use emerging technologies to drive innovation and cost savings while providing the users with a better set of capabilities and a more streamlined user experience."

Avid Systems is a leading-edge technology firm, based out of Washington DC. Avid Systems combines unparalleled experience, comprehensive capabilities across all industries, and business functions. Continuous innovation and rapid transformation have been themes throughout Avid Systems' history.

http://www.avidsys.com/

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