IT Managers struggle with Consumer Technology

I was reading an interesting article yesterday on how IT managers are increasingly challenged by the amount of consumer technology that is creeping into the office through its employees – MP3s, IM, Facebook, USBs

I think there are 2 key factors that will be used to battle this:

1) Cultural – what internal policies will be set on the use of each of these. There are many opinions around whether some of these technologies help or hinder the productivity of employers.

2) Technical – there are many products out there that can help with this challenge. You could simply block the use of Facebook (as I know many of the organisations where my friends work do) or there is more sophisticated technology such as Bitlocker in Windows Vista to control what/if USBs can be used with a PC, as well as protecting the data on a PC if a laptop is misplaced or stolen.

I have even heard that some companies have taken things into their own hands by superglueing shut the USB ports in PCs!