Four hours and thirty minutes. That’s how much time the average American spent on their mobile phone each for nonvoice activities this year according to industry data provided by Statista.
There are multiple apps available for all sorts of things, there’s even an assortment of anti-dating apps. In fact, according to research, there are dozens of apps available that allow you to make friends with people online, without having to first download a dating or social media app.
This figure has been gradually growing each year, as more and more people become connected and mobile phone accessibility becomes increasingly democratized across various parts of the world.
While you might spend more or less time per day on your mobile phone compared to the average American, there’s no denying that we’ve become increasingly dependent on these small devices.
Even more surprising, is that roughly 88 percent of the time we spend on our mobile phones is done in an app. Whether we’re planning to arrange a meet-up with someone, streaming videos, sending off emails, or making payments – we spend a lot of our time using mobile apps for everything in our day-to-day lives.
The Dark Underside of Apps
With our entire lives now seemingly synchronized to our mobile phones, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that mobile apps are often considered a treasure trove of malicious activity for hackers and other bad actors.
Every day, we stand to become victims of a potential cyber security breach, or having our personal information leaked on the internet due to a possible threat – and this is more common than you might think.
In January this year, T-Mobile stated in a regulatory filing that more than 37 million users’ information was leaked due to a potential bad actor infiltrating their security systems. In 2021, industry leaders estimated that more than 3.5 million mobile users were targeted by malicious cyber attackers via text messages and suspicious links.
What’s more, some experts predict that roughly four in ten mobile users are vulnerable to a potential malware attack that can occur at any given time. These attacks are quick, allowing cyber attackers to suck up all your information within a few seconds, and without you knowing.
While the most common attack continues to be malware-based attacks, whereby users are sent a link that contains viruses and are then released onto their mobile device after clicking the link, some attacks can occur due to faulty security infrastructure on mobile apps, or weak security features.
Keeping yourself, and all your personal information on your mobile phone shouldn’t feel like a full-time job, yet, every day millions of users are left having to pay the price for not being more attentive and informed about potential data breaches or viruses that can access the information on your smart device.
Taking Care and Protecting Your Information
While staying informed is one of the best ways to know when a potential strike might take place, taking a few extra steps can help keep your data secure, and further protect any other sensitive information you have stored on your device or any app.
Keep OS Up To Date
Your mobile phone has an integrated security system that helps to protect your device against any suspicious activity that may occur without your noticing. These protocols are often aligned with your devices’ OS or Operating System, and will automatically be updated once the OS is upgraded.
Ultimately, this means that by routinely updating your Operating System or OS, you can improve your phone’s security features, and prevent bad actors from accessing sensitive data you might have stored on your device.
Keep in mind that a mobile phone’s OS security protocol alone isn’t enough to wane off any bad actors or malicious activities. Additional security systems, such as a third-party security firewall, or virus detector can help add an additional layer of protection to your mobile phone and apps.
Limit App Access
Every app you’ve installed on your mobile phone will request access to different features of your device. Some social media apps might request access to your camera, microphone, speaker and photos to provide a more connected experience. Additionally, some apps might request access to your contacts, or if it’s a paid app, you might need to grant access to payment and banking information to complete the transaction.
By limiting the access of apps, you are directly restricting apps from using any additional information or data. This helps to keep your information secure, however, this might cause some limitations for the in-app experience.
You can view what type of information an app has access to by viewing the in-app settings, or reviewing your device settings and selecting the options you feel are most applicable. As a reminder, just because you’ve deleted an app from your device, doesn’t mean that the information it has captured has been restored.
Some mobile apps might keep this information for several months or even years, depending on the terms and conditions you’ve agreed on, and whether you’ve completely terminated your profile or account on the app.
Use app passwords or two-factor authentication
Having a password on your mobile device, and any app that might have sensitive data is one of the best first lines of defense.
By enabling passwords on all your apps, or using biometric security measures such as fingerprints or facial detection, you lower the possibility of bad actors accessing your device’s personal information.
Additionally, you can activate two-factor authentication for specific apps. Two-factor authentication often requires you as the user to approve a login or transaction by completing an additional security check, either by entering a One Time Pin (OTP) sent to your device, or approving the action via an email. Encrypting sensitive data is one of the best ways to protect your information.
At the same time, make sure to use strong and complicated passwords that aren’t easy to remember. Make sure to store all your passwords in one secure place, pen and paper works the best, and regularly update your passwords.
Be wary of suspicious mobile apps
Many apps have additional downloadable features that are available on the app store that can be used as an integrated way to get more from your online experience. You can think of this as a sort of “plug-in” that helps you broaden the capabilities or features of the in-app experience.
Often these additional apps are created by third-party service providers, and while they may work in connection with more popular apps, they’re not necessarily affiliated with the same provider.
Take for example something simple, such as the digital wallet on your mobile phone. While this might be a pre-loaded mobile application, that allows you to link your mobile banking app, or set up a digital banking card, they tend to be two separate entities working in combination.
These types of apps are available for a variety of platforms, and often there are some lesser-known dangers of using these third-party features. Unless you feel that something will help enhance the in-app experience or an extension is needed to improve the functionality of the app, try to avoid having too many different functions or features in downloaded apps.
Don’t download any app without prior research
As already mentioned, there are countless apps available, however, all of these choices have seemingly blurred the lines between those apps that are safe to use, and those that might have weaker security features.
Doing some research will help to shed more light on what type of apps are best suited for your needs, and also highlight any faults within the app’s security features.
By educating yourself, you will know which apps are best to use, depending on your needs, and further keep you informed about any changes that may occur once you’ve downloaded the app, and what type of information the platform may have access to.
Delete or remove unused apps
Finally, one of the best ways to improve your device security is to delete any applications you longer need or have used. However, simply removing the app from your home screen doesn’t mean that your information has been removed from the service provider’s database.
Instead, make sure to completely terminate your account, and any information you have shared with the mobile application when setting up your account.
Once you’ve downloaded all the information from the app, such as messages, photos, or videos that you would like to store on your device, you can consider deleting your profile or account, and only afterward clear the app from your device.
Additionally, you can also check your device’s app settings to make sure that the app is no longer present on your device, or has access to sensitive data.
Final Take
Taking extra care when installing new apps on your mobile will help keep your information protected. More than this, it will ensure that you have followed the necessary steps to limit access to personal data, or further limit the accessibility some apps may have to your device.
By adding a few additional security steps, regularly changing login information, and updating your passwords you will help prevent bad actors from infiltrating your device or hacking your phone.
Don’t fool yourself. Cyber attackers have become smarter and more agile than ever before. Knowing how to circumvent these situations will keep you and your sensitive data safe for as long as possible.
—
This post is republished on Medium.
—
Photo credit: iStock