Mobile threat defense: Crucial consideration for a digital-first ecosystem

Critical mobile apps can be embedded with runtime security controls that monitor and provide real-time security on customer’s device. In-built self-protection capabilities in an app ensuring device policy enforcements, network controls with robust device binding features is the need of the hour to thwart social engineering attempts to defraud the customers.
  • Updated On Sep 20, 2022 at 11:23 AM IST
By- Manish Mimani

We are on the cusp of a massive digital revolution. While ubiquitous connectivity, artificial intelligence (AI), quantum computing and next-gen approaches to transaction management are revolutionizing the digital world, the exponential growth of smartphones is putting mobile apps at the center of our day to day lives.

Betting on digital as a growth lever, the Government has announced a slew of initiatives in the Union Budget 2022 including the introduction of digital currency and 75 Digital Banking Units (DBUs) by scheduled commercial banks. This is being facilitated by a number of government-backed initiatives including the nationwide fiber network under BharatNet to deliver high connectivity in the remotest corners of the country. Regulatory Pragmatism, Enterprising Fintechs & Start Ups and the willingness of the Indian consumer to adopt digital are taking Digitalisation in India to new heights.

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It is pertinent to mention here that India's objective of reaching the US$1 trillion digital economy has to be carefully nurtured with a strong foundation of trust, confidence and cyber security. It is a well known fact that digital has become the new playground for criminal activity. In the first three months of 2022 alone, India witnessed 18 million cyber attacks and threats, with an average of 200,000 attacks every day.

The digital rails on which India is leaping ahead has at its core, the penetration of Mobile phones and the Unified Payment Interface (UPI) for making peer to peer and merchant payments in real time with a few touches on the mobile device. However, what adds a layer of complexity here is that a large number of Indians are having their first digital encounters with the smartphone and are little aware of the risks & the cyber attacks mobile apps can be subjected too. Market reports indicate that India is amongst the countries with highest no. of malware attacks on mobiles and that the security-breach incidents are increasing with the increased adoption of mobile payment by Indians. The latest is a new mobile Banking Trojan virus SOVA about which RBI as well as the Indian Computer Emergency Response Team or CERT-In, the Federal Cyber Security arm have alerted the Banks exhorting them to take immediate measures to protect their mobile app users.

According to a study by Deloitte, India will have 1 billion smartphone users by 2026 with rural areas driving the sale of Internet-enabled phones. It is heartening to note that Indian users have demonstrated savviness in exploiting the advantages offered by high-speed connectivity. India has recorded the highest growth in mobile broadband data usage last year with 4G mobile data growing by 31% in 2021 and the average monthly data usage per individual growing by 26.6% year on year, according to Nokia’s Mobile Broadband Index Report 2022. The total mobile broadband subscriber base increased from 345 million to 765 million over the last five years and the launch of 5G will play a major role in achieving the US$1-trillion digital economy dream. This clearly establishes that mobile phones will play a crucial role in India’s digital story.

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Ensuring robust mobile security has, therefore, become a tearing imperative but unfortunately, securing the mobile phone is easier said than done as people do not adopt good security hygiene such as installing anti-virus, timely updating and patching OS and other apps on the mobile.

Hackers are aggressively pursuing mobile phone users with social engineering strategies and malwares like Oscorp, BRATA, SOVA resulting in an exponential increase in hacking incidents. App providers dealing with financial transactions and / or sensitive data are the prime targets. It is time to aggressively pursue a cyber security strategy that encompasses the mobile device since hackers are mostly targeting the data-rich and the BFSI organizations via user-devices. A comprehensive security approach that comprises user education along with technology capabilities that facilitate governance, controls, compliance, monitoring, prevention and auto-remediation capabilities can mitigate risks and strengthen the security of banking apps.

As people become used to the convenience of mobile app usage, the digital advantage cannot be allowed to become a liability due to security incidents. App providing corporations may work in collaboration with cyber security experts to embed mobile apps with a security architecture having robust capabilities. Critical mobile apps can be embedded with runtime security controls that monitor and provide real-time security on customer’s device. In-built self-protection capabilities in an app ensuring device policy enforcements, network controls with robust device binding features is the need of the hour to thwart social engineering attempts to defraud the customers.

The author is founder & CEO of Protectt.ai.

Disclaimer: The views expressed are solely of the author and ETCIO.com does not necessarily subscribe to it. ETCIO.com shall not be responsible for any damage caused to any person/organization directly or indirectly.
  • Published On Sep 20, 2022 at 11:23 AM IST
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