Smartphone Security

http://animoto.com/play/NWq1c55hk0Htqbbz17sQSg

This is an excerpt from my dissertation about the importance of protecting our smartphones from emerging cyber attacks.

Smartphones are becoming enriched with confidential information due to their powerful computational capabilities and attractive communications features. The Android smartphone is one of the most widely used platforms by businesses and users alike. This is partially because Android smartphones use the free, open-source Linux as the underlying operating system, which allows development of applications by any software developer. This research study aims to explore security risks associated with the use of Android smartphones and the sensitive information they contain; the researcher devised a survey questionnaire to investigate and further understand security threats targeting Android smartphones. The survey also intended to study the scope of malware attacks targeting Android phones and the effectiveness of existing defense measures. The study surveyed the average Android users as the target population to understand how they perceive security and what security controls they use to protect their smartphones. Research findings indicated that Android smartphones lack proactive security measures to provide adequate protection against emerging malware attacks; they also showed that Android apps impose the most imminent security risks, especially because Google Android does not deploy security policies to recognize legitimate apps from malicious ones. Hackers, in turn, have exploited this security flaw and have passed harmful apps into the Android Market. As a result,  personal and financial information residing in Android smartphones is exposed to malware attacks.  Therefore, it is essential to develop effective protection mechanisms. The researcher proposes to build a proactive security framework that can detect and deter malware attacks targeting Android smartphones. 

Two forces that may impact the smartphone security are:
Force #1 : Technology:  This could be a double sword thing because new and more innovative technologies for smartphones can make it hard to protect them since users are usually distracted from the core value of these phones and only focus on the entertainment element of them. On the other side, as more innovative technologies come to the scene, we may see some break through technology that could provide ultimate protection for our smartphones without making users worry about the security aspects of this technology.

Force # 2: Society: our society is becoming increasingly more dependent on these gadgets which motivates hackers to craft more sophisticated attacks to compromise our smartphones and potentially steal our confidential information.