From gaining access to microphones, cameras, and locations of a smartphone to building convincing clones of other apps with the intent to trick users into downloading malware — hackers are constantly after valuable mobile app data, and they have a lot of tools to help them get it.
We all use mobile apps so frequently that it shouldn’t be surprising that they’re targeted by savvy hackers so often, in fact 71% of fraud transactions came from mobile apps and mobile browsers in the second quarter of 2018.
Sensitive personal data is constantly shared with mobile apps, sometimes without users even knowing it. The best way to defend your app and your users against a potential mobile security breach is to prepare for one ahead of time.
A few examples of how hackers exploit weaknesses in mobile app security are:
-
- Lack of multifactor authentication- using multifactor authentication reduces the risk that a hacker can gain access to your app through a user’s weak password. This additional layer of authentication can be the answer to a personal question, an SMS confirmation code to input, or biometric authentication (fingerprint, retina, etc.)
- Reverse engineering- reverse engineering reveals how an app works in the back-end, exposes encryption algorithms, gives access to edit source code, and more to allow hackers to build a hostile copy of your app.
- Malicious code injection- a hacker can use your login forms or comment forms within your app against you by injecting a line of JavaScript code into a section that doesn’t garud against colons or equal signs, especially if they don’t have a character limit.
Thankfully there are steps you can take to protect yourself and your users against an attack, and it’s always wise to consult with a cybersecurity expert. Check out this infographic from CleverTap for some more tips on how to defend against mobile app hackers.
