U S Enviro Office of Inspector General

Office of Environmental Information Should Strengthen Controls over Mobile Devices U S Enviro Office of Inspector General

Publisher Marketing: Although OEI is in the process of developing policies for domestic and international mobile device usage, OEI has no organization-wide standard operating procedures that explain responsibilities for OEI employees and contractors regarding mobile devices. OEI currently does not have effective controls for the five areas of concern noted in the hotline complaint: issuance, disconnection, multiple devices, inappropriate use, and tracking and recovery. We found that supervisors approve employee/contractor requests for mobile devices without guidance on determining the need for a device, and there is no guidance on the frequency with which employees can upgrade a device after it has been issued. OEI has also not established controls to determine when to disconnect devices; over a 6-month period in 2011, 68 OEI employees had zero usage of their mobile devices, incurring costs of about $29,360. Moreover, OEI managers tend not to be concerned about employees having multiple devices, and we found that eBusiness does not correctly reflect the number of devices issued to employees. Therefore, EPA may be paying for service on mobile devices that are not used. In addition, we found that one OEI employee and one OEI contractor made costly personal international phone calls. Finally, procedures and controls for tracking and recovering mobile devices are missing or ineffective.