Tripwire Inc. recently conducted a new survey looking at the attitudes of 1,000 UK consumers and revealed that despite a huge increase in mobile shopping, shoppers do not have security in place to protect the identity and credit card data stored on the device.
Tripwire is a leading global provider of risk-based security and compliance management solutions, enabling enterprises, government agencies and service providers to effectively connect security to their business. They provide the broadest set of foundational security controls including security configuration management, vulnerability management, file integrity monitoring, log and event management. Tripwire solutions deliver unprecedented visibility, business context and security business intelligence allowing extended enterprises to protect sensitive data from breaches, vulnerabilities and threats.
The survey, which was carried out by One Poll in December, revealed that 32 percent of respondents have their mobile device linked to their bank or credit card, yet almost half of those people do not have any security on their mobile, and worryingly, 39 percent of respondents believe the convenience of mobile shopping overrides security concerns. Other findings from the survey revealed that on average shoppers will spend about 260 pounds using their mobile devices, however, only two percent would be comfortable spending over 1,000 pounds.
“The results from our survey highlights the fact that consumers are still not recognizing that cybercriminals are targeting mobile devices to collect personal information and for financial gain,” said Gavin Millard, EMEA technical director at Tripwire. “Because mobile devices are linked to corporate networks and credit cards whilst storing a huge amount of private data, there is a much greater need to keep them secure and protected. Adding a PIN to your lock screen, checking the validity of apps before installing them and ensuring the SSL certificates on shopping sites are correct is easy to do and will help keep the data stored on mobile devices safe from cybercriminals.”
Not only are consumers putting themselves at risk of stolen data, but also their employer’s data. The study also revealed that while 36 percent of consumers have their mobile devices linked to their corporate network, 18 percent of these people don’t have any security installed on their device. About 17 percent of consumers also admitted to holding business data on their mobile devices.
By Pia Talwar