DISA's Smartphone Guidelines

As I reported yesterday, the Defense Information Systems Agency has plans to add support for smartphones to its enterprise email that already supports 1.4 million Army personnel and a bunch of folks from most of the joint commands.

DISA started work on this more than a year ago, according to a draft planning document I managed to track down on the Internet that lays out the security guidelines to connect smartphones to Defense networks.

No surprises here: FIPS 140-2 for encryption, a VPN tunnel, data-at-rest security and the ability for administrators to disable built-in phone cameras.

While it looks like DISA has taken the inevitability of smartphones seriously, signage at its new headquarters at Fort Meade, Md., send a far different message, telling visitors to turn off all wireless gadgets upon entering the building.