5 Mobile Security Threats Every Enterprise Should Know About

Enterprises mobility by definition is the modern architecture of the working environment in which the employees can perform their tasks from anywhere using a variety of devices and applications. The term is commonly referred to as the use of mobile devices such as smartphones, tablets, and even personal laptops for business purpose. Mobility in enterprises covers the data and workforce, making the working environment vital. One of the common examples that are used to clarify the mobility in enterprises is employee gets to add presentation from his enterprise’s system to cloud storage that can be accessed using the personal devices; the employee can make changes and save the presentation on the cloud. However, over the last few years, mobility has gone beyond the convenience part and moved to security ordeal. The present issues that are keeping the mobility organizations to adopt overworked security measures to keep some of the mobile security threats at bay. Hackers have identified some of the easiest techniques to manipulate the system and gain access to various devices.  Let’s learn about some of the biggest mobile security threats in 2019.

1. Bogus Wi-Fi Networks at public space

It’s one of the easiest and sneakiest ways that hackers can take advantage of the vulnerabilities of mobile devices is by using fake wireless networks. The bogus Wi-Fi network is fabricated to appear fine, especially it’s presented as a secured private network wherein the users will mistakenly connect to public Wi-Fi without considering the risk. In public spaces such as airports, malls and common areas where the users find an open Wi-Fi network that will seem reputable but in reality its intent is luring the users to the network, wherein the malicious activities actually begin. All the users today are aware of the lurking dangers of using such a network, but most of them tend to ignore the caution sign, according to the recent survey, 80 percent still connect to them. Most of the users access the public Wi-Fi networks to check their messages, both personal and corporate, giving the hackers a chance to gain easy access to data. IT admins need to develop policies that prevent the employees from connecting to any public Wi-Fi network; the policy should be robust enough to deal with situational Wi-Fi threats that may appear.

2. Malware-Ridden Applications

There are many classifications when it comes to malware threats and ways that can trick hackers into getting infected applications to users. In 2019 study it was surveyed that mobile applications represented one of the most likely vehicles of malware.  Most of the employees that use mobile devices tend to download the application without looking at the authenticity of the app. Some of the malicious apps are made with the same name as the reputable apps, and the users are tricked in downloading the application. These apps are fake applications disguised as legitimate apps and contain malware. Users usually don’t understand this and download the application and enter the private information on such malware affected apps.  There has been more than thousands of cases of malicious applications online, and some of them received millions of downloads. The recent study conducted on such applications have increased by 300 percent, enterprises should delivery a clear policy on what app to download and what requirements it should satisfy.

3. Data Leakage

Mobile devices have poor security when it comes to protecting the data. Hackers are trying to capitalize on the gateway that is easily available to many of the corporate data. The trickiest part about the data leakage is that there could be multiple reasons that can cause data leakage. Many times mobile applications can be leaky space; the data can either be personal or corporate. Emails are considered as one of the easiest techniques that can be used to transfer sensitive business data; an employee making use of mobility solutions can leak the data knowingly or unknowingly. Data leakage is one of the biggest mobile security threats in 2019, and enterprises must be equipped with tools and policies that prevent such type of data leakages. Security of applications that have access to corporate data is imperative, and before mobility solutions are adopted, security measures should be in place.

4. Cryptojacking

One of the fastest growing mobile security threats in 2019 includes crypto jacking. The threat is so real that there is a good chance that some mobility leaders will not actually be aware of it. Cryptojacking involves hackers using someone else’s mobile device to mine the cryptocurrency. Most of the users around the world lack the basic clarity in understanding such type of attacks that happen on a daily basis. Cryptojacking hijacks the devices managing the device performance and makes the device vulnerable to attacks.

Cryptojacking started with much malicious mining applications, although most of the applications have now been banned from the stores. However, websites might still be lurking with them.

5. SMS phishing Attacks

Phishing attacks have been the most common types of threat that security infrastructure face. Phishing scams are used to steal both personal and enterprise data. One of the most common types of such attacks have been through personal messages; the attacker portrays to be a genuine company person asking for the user to call a certain number. When the user usually calls the number all the mobile data from the device is extracted.

Usually, when the attacks take place, both user and enterprise are not aware of the attack. Security software can prevent such types of attack wherein the users are said to avoid unknown or suspicious numbers.

Conclusion

Enterprise mobility is important because it provides the employees with an opportunity to be flexible and has more choice, thus increasing job satisfaction and productivity. Every modern enterprise is investing in mobile applications or enterprise mobility. The major enterprise mobility management vendors and their products include VMware AirWatch, MobileIron, IBMMaaS360, BlackBerry Enterprise mobility, and Citrix XenMobile.

To know more, download recent whitepapers on mobility solution.