Initial access remains the starting point for all breaches—and it typically comes through one of two channels: compromised credentials or compromised devices. This isn’t a new discovery. Every threat report tells the same story.
While identity protection has received significant attention, device management remains a weak link. That’s where the risk lies—and where traditional tools like Mobile Device Management (MDM) and Endpoint Detection and Response (EDR) often fall short.
The Problem with Traditional Device Management
MDM and EDR tools are critical to basic endpoint hygiene. But relying on them exclusively to manage device risk leads to a false sense of security. What organizations really need is device trust—a dynamic, risk-based approach that closes the major gaps in device security. Here are five key limitations of legacy device management—and how a device trust framework addresses them.
1. No Visibility Into Unmanaged Devices
Traditional tools only monitor and protect managed devices. But what about personal laptops, contractor machines, or partner devices accessing company resources? These unmanaged endpoints are invisible to your security stack—yet they often lack essential protections like disk encryption, biometric access, or regular updates.
How device trust helps:
Device trust extends visibility to all devices—managed or unmanaged. A lightweight, privacy-preserving authenticator can gather risk telemetry without requiring administrative control or remote wipe capabilities. This enables continuous compliance enforcement and fast remediation, even for BYOD and personal devices.
2. Gaps in OS Coverage
MDM and EDR solutions are strong on Windows and macOS—but Linux and ChromeOS often get left out. For many tech teams, those platforms are mission-critical, and leaving them unprotected creates dangerous blind spots.
How device trust helps:
Device trust supports a wider range of operating systems, allowing real-time risk evaluation and access control across your entire environment—no matter the device type.
3. No Integration With Access Policy
MDM and EDR tools typically operate in silos, disconnected from identity and access management (IAM) systems. Even if they detect suspicious activity, there’s no mechanism to act on it in real-time and adjust access permissions accordingly.
How device trust helps:
Device trust tightly integrates with IAM to enable adaptive risk-based access policies. Non-compliant devices are denied access to corporate data immediately. Once they return to a secure state, access can be reinstated—without forcing disruptive auto-updates.
4. Risk of Misconfigurations
Even with the right tools in place, misconfigurations can undermine your security posture. A misstep—like not granting full disk access to CrowdStrike—can disable key functionality and leave endpoints exposed.
How device trust helps:
By integrating with device management tools, device trust ensures not just presence but correct configuration. This extra validation layer guards against security blind spots caused by human error or drift.
5. Inability to Detect Advanced Threats
MDM and EDR excel at flagging known threats, but they struggle with deeper posture assessments—like identifying unencrypted SSH keys, unpatched apps with CVEs, or dangerous MacOS extensions.
How device trust helps:
Device trust enables granular posture evaluations, going beyond basic checks to detect complex security gaps. Combined with real-time access enforcement, it strengthens your defense against sophisticated threats.
The Bottom Line: Device Trust Is Essential
Device management tools remain foundational—but they are not enough. To truly secure the device layer, organizations must adopt a device trust approach that delivers:
- Full visibility across managed and unmanaged endpoints
- Cross-platform coverage
- Real-time integration with access controls
- Validation of correct tool configurations
- Detection of advanced and emerging threats
By embedding device trust into your security model, you move beyond surface-level protection to enforce real-time, context-aware defenses—keeping your environment secure without compromising productivity.
