An Asset Barcode System Can Scare Your Ghost Assets Away

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Whether you’re a small or large organization, and regardless of your industry, an asset barcode system can make a significant and measurable difference in your efficiency.

Keeping up with the location and condition of your assets is time-consuming work. You may have an employee or group of employees assigned to the task, but the fact is that it’s very difficult to maintain complete accuracy of your records if you’re tracking and managing those items manually. For example, your IT assets are likely to be moved throughout your organization or offsite for business-related events. The opportunity for theft and loss is great. And simply managing the day-to-day details is challenging in and of itself. It’s very easy to miss updates or lose track of items because your employees are busy, or perhaps because of communication gaps.

Another factor you may not have ever considered is ghost assets. What are they? They’re fixed assets that have vanished from your inventory – due to loss, theft, plain carelessness or some combination of those factors. By the time you even notice they’re gone, you’re likely to have been paying insurance on them for months. In other words, ghost assets can cause organizations to throw away thousands of dollars. Research has found that as many as 30 percent of fixed IT assets are ghost assets. And that’s one scary statistic.

Former employees are also a contributor to ghost assets. A report issued by OneLogin called “Curse of the Ex-Employees” stated that 20 percent of businesses have experienced data breaches by former staff members. And, among those same 20 percent, almost half claimed that more than 10 percent of all data breaches are the direct result of former employees. In an article detailing the OneLogic report, website DarkReading.com states that “The more engrained someone is in an organization, the harder it is to deprovision. Two-thirds of respondents report on-site employees are toughest. Half of the respondents don’t use automated deprovisioning and must manually remove access to corporate applications, a lengthy process that increases the chance former employees can still access their accounts.”

Former employees who are hanging on to company-issued assets may very well have sensitive data stored on those devices. Now that the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is in effect, organizations who are noncompliance can face stiff penalties.

According to PrivacyPolicies.com, to remain compliant with the GDPR, organizations should take such measures as bringing data protection risk into their current crisis management/internal control frameworks; assess their current standards of data protection and consider any improvements they need to institute; identify gaps in compliance and determine how to remedy them; and develop the necessary operational procedures and policies to cover compliance.

Another excellent strategy is to implement an asset barcode system. By outsourcing what used to be an error-prone manual task, you’ll have the peace of mind that comes from knowing your data is accurate, comprehensive and in real-time. You’ll want to find an asset barcode system that brings everyone involved in the lifecycle of your fixed assets into the communication loop, so there are no gaps and you maintain accountability and accuracy. To facilitate that communication, you’ve got to find an easy-to-use system that anyone can learn quickly.

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Asset Panda’s powerful, yet intuitive platform is the most user-friendly asset barcode system on the market today. Find out how our free mobile app can help you save time, money and frustration while you eliminate ghost assets and other waste from your bottom line.

By:

Courtney Roush

Courtney Roush is a freelance writer, editor, and communications strategist with 25 years of experience. Her favorite discipline is crisis communications – and it’s a highly relevant one in our present times.

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