Is it really a must to have IFD when accessing CRM from tablets or smart phones from local network or over VPN?
Official information is ambiguous ( http://www.microsoft.com/en-US/dynamics/crm-customer-center/known-issues-for-crm-for-tablets-and-phones.aspx ). The first sentense says "yes, all the time", the other one says "only over the internet".
Be aware that Internet Facing Deployment (IFD) is required if you are using Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2013 (on-premises version). The system administrator must configure claims-based authentication before users can access Microsoft Dynamics
CRM data with CRM for tablets. If you have your Microsoft Dynamics CRM website available
over the internet but it is not using the Microsoft Dynamics CRM IFD configuration, it is not supported.
Thanks!