IT departments face pressing security challenges with the proliferation of mobile devices within the enterprise, and the protection of sensitive corporate intellectual property on laptops and mobile phones is emerging as a top priority for IT managers.
According to a new forecast from IDC, worldwide mobile security licence and maintenance revenue exceeds $200m today and will continue at a healthy growth rate at least until 2011.

The main security concern a few years ago for businesses was protecting corporate desktops from hackers and preventing malicious code from entering the local or wide area network via wired connections to the internet.

However, the fast growing popularity of mobile devices, and ubiquitous access to wireless networks, require new security measures.

"For most enterprises today, device-based security such as device wipe/lock and encryption of the data on the device are the most important features that a mobile security solution must contain," said Stacy Sudan, research analyst for IDC's Mobile Enterprise Software.

"But in the future, secure content and threat management features like mobile firewall, mobile VPN, and mobile antivirus will gain increased importance for companies seeking to secure further aspects of enterprise mobility."