In general employees intentions are honourable but when they need to ‘get the job done’, they adopt for the path of least resistance i.e quick and easy solutions that they can sign up to for free.  This however creates a minefield for the IT and Compliance departments who tackle a daily myriad of issues around tracking, governance and security of corporate data. With no online service completely immune from attack (take the recent announcements around LinkedIn and Yahoo) the issue is very real and pressing.

Inevitably the bottom line is that the business needs to invest in an ad hoc file transfer solution that enables employees to send files on an ad hoc basis.  Fortunately for businesses this issue has existed for some time, and a number of the managed file transfer vendors we work with offer solutions to these problems.  Selecting the right solution depends upon the number of users, security requirements, size of the data sets, preferred deployment option (on-site/hosted/SaaS), specific functionality required and budget – but that’s where we come in to help you through the vendor selection process.

Finally let’s not forget that there are a wide variety of email clients used in today’s businesses.  The most dominant – Microsoft Outlook has been well addressed by the majority of managed file transfer vendors.  Lotus Notes on the other hand hasn’t received the same time and attention but there are a couple of options out there, I guess this is down to size of their shrinking market share.  When it comes to Apple however everyone falls short.  This has little to do with the developers ability – more with the architecture of Apple Mail, Microsoft Entourage or Outlook for Mac, none of which support plugin’s in the same way.  Still, all of the vendors provide a webmail facility if you need to support Mac OS users.

For further assistance in selecting the most appropriate ad hoc file transfer solution for your business please get in touch with the UK’s leading MFT experts on 0333 123 1240.

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Whilst cloud solutions certainly offer users with a raft of features currently not offered by other proprietary software vendors, they tend to lend themselves to being targets for hackers due to their high profile and wide adoption.  It begs the question, “Should consumer grade cloud based technologies be allowed within the enterprise at all?”

Managed file transfer vendors are fast catching up with the cloud based solutions, adding Dropbox like features to provide users with the simple way of working to which they’ve become accustomed.   Whilst also adding new features such as mobile file sharing capabilities to cover off the BYOD angle, never before have MFT vendors being trying so hard to keep up with the contemporary features that users are demanding.

There are many benefits associated with implementing an in-house managed file transfer solution.  Possibly one of the most important in terms of security (taking into consideration the above) is the fact that they don’t become a high profile, data centre target.  Taking the understated, in-house deployment may well help you to slip under the radar whilst also providing a range of security features.

If your company is using Dropbox to share data then Pro2col can help.  We’ve worked with various companies across a range of industry sectors to replace consumer grade file sharing technologies.  Call one of our sales consultants on 0333 123 1240.

The post Dropbox or MFT – that is the question… appeared first on Managed File Transfer Solutions | Secure File Transfer Software | UK.