In this day and age majority of us rely on our mobile device on a daily basis to perform various daily tasks such as sending text messages, internet banking for paying bills, surfing the internet to look up reviews on restaurants etc. Due to this most mobile phones often contain a fair amount of private information that should be stored securely. Mobile device security has become an increasingly important concern amongst mobile device users with the increasing number of cyber threats these days.

This leads us to the question of what exactly is mobile device security?

Mobile security is the protection of smartphones, tablets, laptops and other portable computing devices, and the networks they connect to, from threats and vulnerabilities associated with wireless computing. Mobile security is also known as wireless security.

Recent studies have shown that businesses are showing increasing interest in mobile device security due to the rise in cyber threats and business owners realise that majority of the mobile devices provided by the business to their employees often contain various valuable information which could easily be stolen.

There are various of ways to increase your mobile device security may it be your personal mobile device or as a business.

The most basic way of securing your mobile device is set a password, Personal Identification Number (PIN), passcode, gesture or fingerprint that must be entered to unlock the device. Don’t forget to put PINs on your SIM card, voicemail and also ensure the device is set to automatically lock.

Secondly it is recommended to install a reputable anti virus software on your mobile device. There are various kinds of anti virus softwares and if you’re interested we are able to provide you some advice on which to pick may it be for your own personal device or for your business needs.

Besides that, it is also advisable to leave Bluetooth turned off or in hidden mode (hidden) when you are not using it.

Record the International Mobile Equipment Identifier (IMEI) of your handset. Your IMEI is a 15 or 17 digit number often printed on a label under the battery or found in the Settings under General information about your device. If your device is lost or stolen, report this number to your provider and they can stop the handset from being used.

It would also be advisable to always use a VPN when using public Wi-Fi at public places like at the airport, cafes, shopping centres and hotels. These "open" networks also involve un-encrypted connections, leaving users at great risk. These hotspots are an easy target for hackers and nefarious people trying to steal login passwords, credit card information and content of communications or other personal details. These also pose other threats, such as man-in-the-middle attacks, Wi-Fi sniffing and malware.

Finally we also encourage users to switch on the remote locking or wiping function if the device supports this function to enable the user to remotely erase all the information in their device in case it gets stolen or missing.

Besides increasing the security of your mobile device we also encourage users to regularly backup their device either with a backup application or by manually syncing the device with a computer.

You may contact us if you are interested in finding out more about anti virus softwares or cloud services to backup and store your data for your personal device or business.