Restrict App Installing, Finding Device and MDM

[CyberBeaR]

Hey, everyone! This is my first post, I'm a newbie here.

I work for a Hospital and we use to take pictures of the newly admitted patients. However our camera doesn't recognize the memory card anymore so instead of buying a new one I thought it'd be a good idea to use one of the Windows Mobile 8.1 phones we have lying around instead.

My idea was to take pictures with the phone and having them being sync'ed to OneDrive and also installing EasyTransfer (ideas are welcome) as a backup plan, so we could send the pictures to PCs in order to be printed.

However, I'd like to be able to restrict the person using the mobile device to install anything from the Windows Store (mostly concerns with Facebook and Whatsapp, as our network doesn't block those domains). I tried searching for passwords on the Windows Store but the only thing I found that could be close to what I wanted was the Parental Control function, and I think it only restricts ages..

And my other issue is about theft, supposing a employee secretly takes the device, would it be easy to find it just by using the native Find My Phone at Settings - Privacy?

One more thing, I've heard of Mobile Device Management for Enterprises. Is it something hard to manage/use? Will I need some third-party software to be able to manage the devices? I'm the closest thing the Hospital has for an IT, but I'd consider myself just an advanced user, not that familiar with command line or programming..

That's it! If you have any ideas, please don't be shy, anything helps!

 

[jmshub]

Hello and welcome to our message board.

Using a Windows Phone to take pics of customers would be a fine idea. A few points however...

Do you want pictures of patients to automatically upload to OneDrive? I don't know if that would be compliant with HIPAA laws, but I'm certainly not an expert.

Using windowsphone.com to find your phone will work, but if you need the ability to lock the phone down to prevent installing apps, you will need an MDM solution.

MDM solutions vary greatly in features and options, but there is a cost involved. Most of them will be relatively expensive because they will want to offer you a solution to manage all of the mobile devices in your organization. This is a growing field, but if you want to look at some of the brands that are highly rated in the MDM space, look at VMWare's Air-Watch, Good Technologies, and Mobile Iron.

 

[CyberBeaR]

Thanks for the reply!

I had to google the meaning of HIPAA. I'm not sure of my country's equivalent to this legislation, but either way the pictures are for internal use only and all of our patients have to sign papers authorizing pictures or videos of them being taken. But yes, the idea would be the pictures being uploaded automatically to OneDrive through our WiFi (the phone won't have a SIM card). If by some reason the pictures don't upload to OneDrive I thought of Easy Transfer as an offline solution. Of course as a last resort we could go on cables..

So to lock the phone I will need a MDM solution?

I noticed there's an option for adding an enterprise account (e-mail), is this only for MDM purposes?

EDIT: I think I found a way to prevent from installing apps from the Windows Store, using the Kid Mode, setting a password and only allowing two apps to be used, Lumia Camera and Easy Transfer.