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Best mobile security practices are guidelines and recommend security measures to protect mobile devices and the confidential information they contain. Best mobile security practices apply to personal use in mobile devices and the business environment, and the guidelines are similar in both scenarios.
10 Mobile Security Best Practices
The most common best practices in mobile security are:
1. The User authentication
Restrict access to the device by requiring user confirmation. Most mobile devices can be locked with a screen lock, password, or personal identification number (PIN), but usually, these methods are disable by default.
In the event of accidental loss or theft on the mobile device, the device data is protected by requiring authentication before accessing the mobile device. Make sure you use strong passwords to make it harder for potential thieves to gain access to your device.
2. Update the mobile operating system with a security patch
Keep your mobile phone’s operating system and software up to date. Mobile operating systems such as Apple iOS, Google Platform for Android, and Microsoft’s Windows Phone provide additional security for users by providing regular updates to address vulnerabilities and other mobile security threats. These updates are not always update automatically, so mobile users should enable automatic updates or update their phones and apps manually regularly.
3. Regularly back up your mobile device
Make sure your mobile device data is back up regularly. Saving a backup of your device to another hard drive or cloud allows you to restore data if your device is damage, lost or stolen. To make the backed up data as up-to-date as possible, we recommend that you use a backup utility or program that runs automatically according to the set schedule.
4. Use encryption
Encryption applies not only to data stored on the phone but also to data transmitted using secure technologies such as VPNs. One of the best practices in mobile security is not to send confidential or personal information through public Wi-Fi hotspots, especially unprotected sites, without using secure transfer capabilities such as a VPN.
5. Alternatively enable remote data deletion
Make sure your device has the option to delete data remotely and you know how to use it in case your device is stolen or lost. For example, Apple’s Find My iPhone app offers the ability to remotely delete data and find a lost iPhone.
6. Turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth if you don’t need them
By disabling these connection settings when not needed, you restrict hackers from accessing via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth.
7. Don’t Fall for Phishing Schemes
Avoid potential phishing scams and malware threats by clicking on links from unreliable sources or opening email attachments. They can come from fraudulent sources or legitimate businesses that pretend to be friends.
8. Avoid All Jailbreaks
Make sure your phone is locked and not jailbroken. Hacking your smartphone by jailbreaking allows users to run unknown or unsupported apps, but most of these apps are vulnerable to security. Most of Apple’s iOS vulnerabilities only affect jailbroken iPhones.
9. Add the mobile security app
Find and identify trusted mobile device security apps that extend the security features installed on your device’s mobile operating system. Also popular third-party security providers like Lookout, Avast, Kaspersky, and Symantec offer mobile security apps for iOS, Android, and Windows Phone.
10. Best Practice Reports on Mobile Security
In a corporate or small business environment, IT staff should advise employees on best practices on the company policy and mobile device security.
Best Practices for Mobile Application Security – A Must for All Developers
Protection is a very important concept. Mobile application security best practices should be include to ensure that your application is risk-free and that your personal information is not expose to unauthorized persons such as hackers. To publish your application, you need to do the right type of security review.
The approaches that developers need to consider to provide the best service to consumers and improve the experience include:
Data security needs to be strengthen: Application developers need to focus on developing appropriate security policies and guidelines to prevent hackers from easily blocking users. Also this process properly applies data encryption and uses firewalls and other security tools (if available) to securely share information between devices. App developers should follow published guidelines for Android and iOS apps.
Password should not be save:
Most apps require you to save your password so that users can enter details and relax each time they access the app. If your cell phone is stole; your password can also be misuse, giving the thief full access to all your information. To avoid all these scenarios, users need to make sure that they do not need to remember their passwords on all mobile devices. A good alternative to this option is that if you lose your mobile phone; you must store your password on the application server before you can log in and change your password.
Logout session should be enforce: Many users ignore sign outs from your website or app. This is the most common method for banks and other payment applications. However, doing so can be very harmful to the user. This is the main reason why the best payment methods always end up making your user sessions more secure.
security team
Security experts should be consult at all times: The security team and application developers are very experience; but they can help third parties provide a new perspective on the issue. For this reason, application developers need to take into account the opinions of security experts to fix bugs and reduce exceptions. All organizations need to ensure that development teams; have access to application security features and review them from third-party vendors to review and maintain the highest quality standards.
There should be multi-factor authentication: Multi-factor authentication provides the highest level of security each time a user logs in to an application. It’s also very easy for hackers to guess and helps solve weak password issues that don’t affect the security of your application. This multi-factor authentication also helps; provide a secret code that can be share with passwords to improve security and the user experience. The code will be sent by SMS or email. As a result, hackers are less likely to access these applications.
The concept of penetration-based testing: This concept is known for testing application vulnerabilities. This identifies vulnerabilities in all applications that hackers may use to compromise security. Weekly password policies and other issues are very easy to resolve. When a hacker rebuilds an application, security can help determine if a vulnerability exists. We strongly recommend that you choose the penetration testing option to make your entire application very secure. Also the most common tests are white-box and black-box tests to identify security issues.
Use of personal devices should be avoid:
To reduce the overhead costs of the procurement system; many organizations prefer the ability of employees to work on their own devices. This can cause problems on personal devices that are already running on the employee’s computer, and vice versa. As a result, problems such as Trojans and malware can spread from device to device and eventually affect all devices. Therefore, organizations should discard all software and devices that need to be connect to the office so that they can fully and thoroughly analyze the process before granting access.
coding requirements
Third-party libraries should be used with caution: Third-party libraries improve coding requirements and greatly simplify the development process. This can be a risky proposition. Therefore, you should limit the number of users of the library and set appropriate rules to best manage these libraries against attacks.
Session processing should be done correctly: all sessions on mobile devices take more time than on laptops. This increases the load on the server. To make the session more secure, you should use tokens instead of device credentials. Codes can be cancel at any time, which is very useful in case your device is stole. Developers should always consider options to end training.
The application developer should take all other precautions; for example, B. very secure key management and proper and regular testing of the application. Every day, the latest threats can damage your device in a variety of ways. Therefore, it is the responsibility of the software developer to take various measures to improve the user experience with appropriate levels of advanced security.