How Intune Fixes Your Device Nightmare

We’ve spent two parts of this series on the problem: laptops bought with zero plan behind them, phones nobody’s tracking, and a gap between what you think is protected and what isn’t. Now let’s get onto the good news; i.e. what changes once Intune is properly set up and why it’s worth the hassle.

A Lost Device Stops Being a Panic

Without any device management solution, a lost or stolen device is not only a cost but also a risk. However, enrol said device in Intune (whether it’s a Windows laptop, Mac, or mobile phone) and if it goes missing, you’ve got an answer to “what can they get to.” Encryption means the data’s unreadable without the right credentials, and remote wipe functionality means you can act straight away instead of just hoping for the best. Compare that to an unmanaged laptop walking off, where nobody can say what was on it, let alone whether it was protected.

Patching Stops Being Someone’s Job to Remember

Unpatched software is one of the easiest ways in for an attacker, and not because a fix wasn’t available, but because nobody applied it. Sure, individuals can manage Windows updates on devices themselves, but when’s the last time you checked your Windows version or verified the monthly security patch has been successfully installed.

Intune pushes updates on a schedule across every managed device from one place, so it doesn’t come down to how many times someone’s willing to click “remind me later.”

No matter if your business has five or fifty-five devices, that alone removes a genuine, recurring risk that would otherwise depend entirely on people’s habits.

Getting In Depends on More Than a Password

Intune has the ability to work in tandem with Conditional Access. This is a feature that allows much more effective management of account access to various resources.

For example, instead of treating a correct password as good enough, Conditional Access checks whether the device itself is up to scratch, encrypted, patched, properly enrolled, before it gets anywhere near company email or files.

A device that doesn’t meet the standard doesn’t get in, regardless of whether the password was right, and that’s the difference between a policy that’s written down somewhere and one that’s enforced.

One Baseline, Applied Automatically

Rather than setting up individual firewall rules, password requirements, and security settings on every single machine by hand, Intune rolls out a consistent baseline the moment a device is enrolled. Whether it’s a new starter or a replacement laptop, every device lands in the same secure state without anyone having to remember what to configure.

Outlaw’s Intune baseline policies have been built over years, are regularly updated, and align to industry standards such as Cyber Essentials. Having Intune-managed devices, ensures these baselines can effectively protect your user accounts, data, and devices.

Personal Phones, Protected Without Being Taken Over

We covered this properly in Part 2, but it’s worth reiterating. App protection policies let Intune lock down company data inside Outlook and Teams on someone’s personal phone, without touching the rest of it. In essence, the apps are ‘containerised’ so that IT can only access the parts that relate to your business. This could mean a PIN to open work apps, no copying data into personal apps, ability to block screenshots, and a wipe that only ever touches company data, so you get the protection while the employee keeps their personal phone exactly as it was.

What This Looks Like Once It's All Running

All of these improvements add up and can entirely change what a potential security incident look like. A lost laptop turns into a quick remote wipe, a leaver’s phone loses access in one click instead of becoming a loose end nobody remembers and an unpatched vulnerability gets closed automatically instead of sitting open for an unspecified amount of time. What’s more, new starters get a properly set up device on day one, rather than whatever the last person’s laptop happened to have on it and newly-provisioned devices are also automatically configured with the latest policies.

Coming Up Next

Part 4 wraps up this series: what a realistic rollout looks like, going from zero device management to a properly managed fleet without turning anyone’s week upside down.

Want to See What You're Already Paying For?

If you’re on Microsoft 365 Business Premium, there’s a good chance most of what’s above is already sitting in your licence, unused, and it’s worth a quick check to see what’s there and what it’d take to switch on.

That’s exactly what we look at in our Free M365 Assessment, alongside a clear picture of where your setup currently stands.