How To Improve Mobile Security For Your Organization

BY Editor

Today mobile phones are the most common used electronic devices and are widely used for communication for making and receiving phone calls, text messages, internet surfing. Smartphones are replacing laptops and computers, for searching for information online, internet surfing and also for internet banking. Many organizations are taking advantages of advances in mobile phone technology to use mobile phones for keeping in touch with their employees. Typically these mobile phones will provided by the organization along with a SIM card so that the employee can be contacted any time by the employer as well as customers.

However, compared to other electronic devices, mobile phones are extremely vulnerable to theft, because of their compact size as well as large market for stolen mobile phones. Often the mobile phone will have important business information like the contacts of the mobile user, important SMS messages, and emails if the mobile is internet enabled. This also makes the mobile phone an attractive target for business rivals, who can steal the mobile phone to get easy access to the contacts of the business owner or employee.

Hence it is important to improve mobile security for an organization to prevent loss of mobiles, which in addition to causing financial losses and waste of time, can be exploited by business rivals. One of the best ways to improve mobile security is hold short term seminars or training courses wherein mobile users are educated on mobile security. These seminars will cover all aspects of mobile security – keeping the mobile physically safe from robbers and also from hackers who may misuse a security flaw or backdoor in the mobile to get control of the mobile. It is always advisable to keep the mobile safely in a bag, pocket or on the table, and never let it go out of sight. Even when the mobile owner has to go somewhere else for a short time, it always advisable to carry the mobile with him. The mobile should be kept for charging only when the mobile owner is present, often the mobile is stolen when no one is looking, by robbers who are keeping the real mobile owner under surveillance, so that they can grab the mobile at the first possible opportunity.

Often the stolen mobile is used for identity theft. There are cunning identity theft gangs that track mobiles which are purchased on installment basis using credit cards. They then arrange to have the mobile stolen at the first possible opportunity and use the stolen mobile to fraudulently claim ownership of the credit card (which they do not possess). It is extremely unfortunate that these identity thief gangs have powerful backers who will support and condone their criminal activities. Hence it is advisable not to purchase mobile phones on installment basis.

Increasingly a large number of mobile phones available are smartphones which are similar to mini computers in the kind of software installed in them. Like any other software, there are security flaws and backdoors which are periodically exploited by hackers, and the phone manufacturer will release software updates which will fix these backdoors and security flaws. The mobile phone user should always ensure that the software in the phone is updated to the latest version, to take care of the bugs in the software. Similarly all the apps on the phone should be updated properly.

Mobile phones are often hacked using Bluetooth and Wi-Fii connections, which hackers will misuse to download malware on the phone. Hence it is advisable to install an anti-virus software on the mobile phone, which will detect and remove any virus and malware on the phone as soon as it is installed. The mobile phones have a provision for disabling the Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connection, and this feature should be used when the mobile is being used in hostile conditions.

There have been reports that phone calls and SMSes from certain numbers or persons can install a virus on the mobile phone or cause damage. Hence it is advisable to ignore the phone calls from unknown suspicious numbers (especially those from a foreign country) and immediately delete any strange SMSes. These are only a few of the measures which have to be implemented to improve mobile security, more stringent measures may be needed depending on the size and type of organization.

Author Bio

Sarah Hendricks who is a security expert on protecting users and businesses from hackers and data leakage with best mobile security provider, NQ.com. NQ Mobile provides all kinds of mobile security; users in the office, at home, or working remotely are all subject to attack, click here to learn where to find mobile security for business.