If your organisation’s users are running Microsoft 365 and using Windows, there’s a compliance tool you need to know about.
It lets you apply consistent, auditable security policies across devices, cut device provisioning time, and demonstrate alignment with IT security frameworks.
You may already be paying for it as it is included in the popular Microsoft 365 E3, E5 and F3 subscriptions. It’s also available as a paid add-om to other M365 subscriptions.
Intune – Microsoft’s Underappreciated Compliance Tool
Intune is a cloud-based service for managing endpoints across Windows, macOS, iOS and Android.
It helps you create a more homogeneous IT estate that’s easier to support, more secure, and more compliance-friendly.
How? By helping you configure and enforce security policies, deploy apps, monitor device compliance and automate device setup, centrally and at scale.
Intune is ideal for organisations with remote/hybrid workers, confidential client data, and clients that value supplier cybersecurity.
Standardise Your Device Setup and Configuration
Intune can help you spot and fix inconsistent patching across your device estate, inconsistent settings across devices, and unhelpful user-initiated changes to settings.
Intune lets you define and implement configuration profiles covering BitLocker encryption, antivirus use, OS updates, firewall settings, browser restrictions and application installation.
Apply profiles to devices based on group membership, location, operating system or hardware type. Within the Intune portal, you can view compliance statuses, configuration success rates, and policy implementation failures.
This supports your efforts to implement IT security controls, such as those required by Cyber Essentials and ISO 27001 relating to IT asset management, configuration management, and secure system engineering.
Streamline Provisioning and Onboarding
Intune integrates with Windows Autopilot to automate new device provisioning. You can assign a deployment profile in advance so when the device is turned on, it automatically enrols in Intune, and deploys the right apps, security settings and configurations for each user.
No reimaging. No manual setup. No delays, even if the device being configured is remote. This simplifies onboarding, making it faster, less fiddly and more consistent.
Simplify Device Admin at Scale
The Intune admin centre gives you live control over your entire device estate.
You can add or remove applications, enforce patching policies, run PowerShell scripts, reboot devices, wipe corporate data, or block access – without the user having to be on the corporate WAN or LAN.
Build Compliance into Day-to-Day IT Operations
You can define compliance policies governing hard-disk encryption, antivirus use, OS patching and device health. These are tracked on real-time dashboards showing compliant vs non-compliant devices, breakdowns by risk factor, and historical trends.
Access to Microsoft 365 apps can be cut off if the device falls out of alignment with baseline security requirements. You can notify the user, trigger remediation or quarantine access automatically.
This supports ISO 27001 controls relating to vulnerability management, access restriction, and compliance evidence.
Make BYOD Less of a Security Headache
Intune allows you to implement a bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policy without requiring full device enrolment. You can apply app protection policies to specific work-related applications—such as Outlook, Teams or OneDrive—containing corporate data, without having full control over the device.
These policies enforce encryption, block data transfer to unmanaged apps, require a screensaver PIN, and allow selective wiping of data once access is removed. It’s a controlled way to implement BYOD while reducing data protection risks and administrative hassle.
BYOD is not ideal from a security perspective, but if managed properly, it can forestall a much worse setup: Shadow IT with no IT-department oversight. Better to have some control, via Intune, than none.
Bear in mind that we’re not only talking about PCs and Macs here. If your staff access work emails on their mobiles, you need to keep those devices secure too. Intune can help with that.
Get Actionable Insights into Your Device Security
Intune’s reporting provides detailed, real-time visibility into device compliance, update deployment, software inventory and firewall and antivirus protection.
With Intune’s endpoint analytics, you can detect performance issues before users complain—such as long boot times, failed app launches or degraded hardware.
Reports can be filtered by platform, business unit or geography, supporting better capacity planning and board-level reporting.
Build on Your Existing Microsoft Stack
Intune integrates natively with Microsoft Defender for Endpoint (threat detection and device risk scoring), Autopilot (streamlined device provisioning), Entra ID (conditional access and role-based policy targeting) and Microsoft Purview (data discovery, classification and protection).
This minimises data silos, improves security, and makes IT easier to manage.
How Syntura Can Help
We can work with your IT team to deploy, optimise and integrate Intune into IT operations, so your device estate becomes more manageable, secure and easier to support.
Typically, this might be part of a broader security transformation:
- Improving endpoint protection against viruses, malware and data leaks by rolling out Microsoft Defender for Endpoint.
- Protecting your AWS, Azure or Google Cloud resources with Microsoft Defender for Cloud.
- Boosting data protection and compliance by implementing Microsoft Purview
- Speeding up IT security investigations and remediation with the help of AI, courtesy of Copilot for Security.
- Tightening network security with Zero Trust Network Access that integrates your identity and access management tools and builds upon existing conditional access policies.
Whether you’re looking to simplify desktop management, improve compliance with IT security standards, or reduce IT vendor sprawl, Syntura’s experts can help.
Call Syntura on 020 7847 4510 or email info@syntura.io to learn more about how we can help your IT team take control of your device estate, reduce cyber risk, and make your IT operations less manual.