Tag: mobile app security

What is mobile application testing and why is it critical to security?

Enterprises of all size need to understand their app vulnerabilities and how to mitigate risk.

Mobile application testing is a critical practice in safeguarding apps and keeping you and your users safe from all types of attack.

A comprehensive mobile app security strategy includes the right tests, shielding and practices.

The first step of effective security strategy is through mobile application testing.  It has rapidly grown in importance as smartphones, tablets, and wearables have become ubiquitous worldwide.  The trend toward using these devices for banking, payments, shopping and other activities using sensitive private and financial information has increased the appeal of these devices to cybercriminals and digital vandals. Banks and corporations are boosting their security, as should anyone with an app.

More than two out of every three large enterprises have experienced a mobile data breach. Of those, each cost as much as $3 million per year. Increasingly, attacks are reaching smaller companies as well, as criminals have built strategies around breaching mid-sized and even smaller sized businesses. The estimated cost of mobile cyber breaches worldwide has reached $50 billion per year and rising.

Mobile application testing helps mitigate the rapidly rising spectrum of security risks.

Three out of every 5 mobile apps are currently vulnerable to attacks. Sixty-seven percent of apps manipulate user data. When taking into consideration that 59 percent of Android apps and 42 percent of iOS apps exfiltrate data, and 78 percent of mobile threats are through apps, this issue simply cannot be taken seriously enough.

Eighty three percent of organizations hire outside developers to create their apps, and 25 percent do not take adequate steps for securing those apps. To prevent security breaches and minimize any that do occur, it is critical to uncover security vulnerabilities in every component of the application’s environment.  It’s vital to discover the issues before attackers can find them and exploit them.

Mobile application testing is the core strategy for identifying those security vulnerabilities.

A mobile application testing tool like Pradeo Mobile can provide the solution enterprises require to protect themselves from such vulnerabilities and unexpected behaviors.  This threat detection technology employs patented artificial intelligence (AI) processes for spotting and qualifying behaviors and vulnerabilities with exceptional precision.  Since its inception, this platform has detected billions of unexpected behaviors and vulnerabilities.

This mobile app security testing tool allows you to:

  • Choose the way the service is implemented, including in SaaS, On Premise, or as an API for integration within the System Development Life Cycle, depending on the organization’s needs.
  • Use a pre-defined security policy or choose to customize one to best reflect the specifics of the business. This can help to ensure that the only threats that are flagged are those that will be relevant to the company.
  • The Pradeo mobile application testing tool leverages next-generation technology to conduct solid and reliable static and dynamic analysis. From there, vulnerabilities, as well as simple and complex behaviors, can be identified with precision.
  • Receive a custom-generated security status and detailed report laid out for at-a-glance comprehensive views of the security levels of your app and threats that may be present.

Trustworthy and reliable mobile application testing makes it possible to identify and automatically remedy unwanted behaviors and repackage apps as per the security policy.

Mobile security shortfalls plague businesses

A new report revealed the lack of protection enterprises are putting into place on employee devices.

MobileIron has released a new report providing insight on the state of mobile security shortfalls in business. Enterprises are inadequately securing employee mobile devices and apps. This leaves them open to a spectrum of cyber threats, says the MobileIron report.

The results of the study were published in the 2016 Q2 Mobile Security and Risk Review.

Fewer than 5 percent of companies have adequately implemented threat detection software. A mere 8 percent of enterprises have enforced updates to operating systems. Failing to take these very basic steps represents considerable mobile security shortfalls, says the report. Moreover, 40 percent of businesses have experienced a loss or theft of mobile devices. That represents an increase of 7 percent over only two quarters beforehand, in Q4 2015.

The insight provided by these statistics in mobile security shortfalls is considered to be quite alarming.

The main problem is that the number of mobile devices used for business is rising exponentially. Moreover, those devices are being used with a dramatically larger number of mobile apps. At the same time, the number of mobile security threats is growing explosively. The landscape is, therefore, becoming much more dangerous very quickly. However, businesses are not even covering the basics to make sure their data is secure.

According to MobileIron lead architect, James Plouffe, “The velocity of mobile attacks is increasing, but the latest data shows that enterprises are still not doing the things they could be to protect themselves. This lack of security hygiene demonstrates that enterprises are alarmingly complacent, even when many solutions are readily available.”

This situation is less problematic in the U.K. There, businesses take greater action against mobile security shortfalls than their counterparts from other countries. The research indicated that only 39 percent of U.K. businesses were out of compliance. This was the fewest among all the countries studied. Moreover, they also had the fewest compromised devices at only 4 percent. Furthermore, they experienced the lowest rate (17 percent) of having staff members remove mobile device management software from their smartphones and tablets.

Exit mobile version