The article
in which I read was “10 Security Trends to Watch in 2012”. Number four on this
list is “Mobile Devices Get Anti-Theft”. I found this part of the article to be
very interesting. This point of the article described the security risk
associated with owning a smart phone or any mobile phone for that matter.
Unlike laptops and Pc’s, mobile phones are not necessarily under attack by
viruses that come over the internet, though instances like this do occur.
Mobile phones are at high risk of being lost or stolen. This is an issue because
with the ever expanding amount of information not only kept on peoples mobile
devices, but also accessed from peoples mobile devices. With the ease of taking
ones mobile device there has become a large outbreak in the amount of mobile
phones that get stolen for peoples banking, credit card, and other information.
In an effort to stop this information from being taken, a device by the name of
Blue Watchdog has been created as a warning system to alert you when your
device is more than thirty meters away. “The
Blue Watchdog is manufactured in Switzerland and is compatible with more than
80% of phones in use in America and Europe.”( http://www.gizmag.com/blue-watchdog-mobile-phone-all-purpose-anti-theft-device/16471/)
which makes it a very useful product, especially for companies who may be
worried about the loss of a company smart phone.
Also in the article was a portion
titled “Mobile Malware continues to increase”. I found this portion of the
article to be extremely informative because I have yet to hear anything about
this. According to the article, there are specific malwares being developed for
the ever popular android platform. As the popularity of the android platform
increases, there are more and more “cyberthugs” gearing up to hack the platform
and gain ones information. However, this is not very lucrative for attackers
because most people keep their financial information on their laptops or Pc’s,
not their android powered phones. The article goes on to state that “attackers' biggest bang for the buck continues to be
attacking Windows systems.”(http://informationweek.com/news/security/vulnerabilities/232400392),
which is often the operating system most used on one’s personal laptop or Pc.
Its amazing how far we've come, when we were in middle school and lost our phone all it meant was we lost our numbers. Now if we lose our phone we have to worry about the wrong person finding it and accessing personal information. And it’s a shame how much theft occurs for smart phones because people know that important information can be stored on smart phones these days. Blue Watchdog sounds like a good idea but I’m curious as to how many people possibly use it, and how effective it really is. But what truly fascinates me about the article you read, was how there is mal-ware which can infect an Android platform. Then again; it is not surprising considering that these devices are practically mini computers.
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