People all over the world use mobile devices on a daily basis. With the rapid advance in mobile technologies, smartphones have become an unavoidable component of our bags and pockets. In other words, we carry mobile devices everywhere and use them to complete a wide variety of actions from taking photos, making calls, and scrolling social media, to making bank transactions, and shopping online.
Even though mobile devices are extremely convenient and play an important role in the overall quality of life, they can also be considered a vulnerability both for businesses and individuals. Smartphones are by far the easiest device to hack or gain unauthorized access to. Unfortunately, many mobile device owners don’t make it very difficult for hackers to achieve their goals. Mobile device security is so neglected that phones have become one of the largest cybersecurity threats of our age.
One of the largest weaknesses within a company are its employees. However, if we further narrow down the list of vulnerabilities that expose businesses to security risks, we will come to the conclusion that employees are considered a weakness for a company because of the mobile devices they use on a regular basis. These mobile devices are often left unprotected, which makes it easy for hackers to access confidential business data or people’s personal information such as addresses or credit card details.
People share sensitive data via mobile devices regularly, from text messages and calls, to more critical activities such as bank transactions or shopping. Many employees connect their mobile devices to public networks in coffee shops or malls where they access sensitive data or share business-related information. Being connected to these networks leaves enterprise data at risk because hackers can easily intercept conversations or file transfers without protection. Therefore, it is easy to see why mobile device security is so important for small businesses and large corporations as well.
The NIST cybersecurity framework consists of a variety of security guidelines that include mobile device security methods. It is highly recommended to follow the NIST guidelines to secure smartphones or other types of mobile devices, whether for the sake of a business or for the sake of an individual users.
The framework encourages educating employees on the importance of mobile device security, as well as monitoring and controlling devices connected to enterprise networks. The NIST framework further emphasizes that mobile devices must support security objectives such as confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Furthermore, it features numerous guidelines for securing mobile devices from a variety of threats.
Neglecting mobile device security can lead to unwanted consequences or events such as data breaches and cybersecurity attacks. The best way to ensure thorough mobile device security is to follow the guidelines provided in the NIST framework for cybersecurity. Other ways of protecting your smartphone from security threats include locking the screen with a password, using a virtual private network, as well as restricting unnecessary app permissions.