Security isn't the kind of thing you should play fast and loose with, and the same goes for security online. In a day and age where we manage almost all of our lives on the Internet, having a computer, phone or tablet that's potentially open to mischievous entities is far from ideal, but that's the position users of Internet Explorers find themselves in today.
Last month, we reported on a piece of Android malware that turned Android devices into Bitcoin miners, and now, a security firm has highlighted a few more suspect apps over at the Google Play Store. Given the growing popularity of cryptocurrency, mobile devices were always going to be targeted in this way, but the frequency in which these attacks appear to be occurring will certainly be seen as cause for alarm.
Google has just announced via the official Android blog that it is in the process of rolling out some additional security mechanisms to the world's most popular mobile operating system. The blog post, which was written and published by an Android security engineer by the name of Rich Cannings, gives a brief overview on some of Android's existing security based positives before continuing to announce that the newly added features will boost the already existing Verify Apps functionality in the going fight against malicious content.
If you're an Internet junkie then the chances are high that you've come across the Heartbleed OpenSSL bug that rose to prominence on Monday. A number of extremely popular and frequently visited websites such as Pinterest, NASA, StackOverflow, OKCupid and Airbnb have the OpenSSL cryptographic library embedded into their architecture, and therefore have become immediately susceptible to the bug. Heartbleed was initially discovered by a Google security engineer in conjunction with Codenomicon, but what does it mean for you and your Internet usage?
Android's biggest weakness may be the huge numbers in which smartphones running the software have sold, but it's fairly safe to say at this point that phones and tablets running various flavors of Android are less than secure. In fact, the hacking of Android-powered devices is such a problem that it's been the beneficiary of plenty of attention from the security fraternity.
Starting with iOS 7, Apple introduced a new security mechanism into all iOS devices that required a user to disable Find My iPhone before an iCloud account could be deleted or the device could be restored. This, of course, requires access to the password associated with that Apple ID. The system was heralded as a great step forward for Apple, but it seems that it is not completely secure, with the discovery of a bug that allows the whole process to be bypassed. More details and video demo can be found right here.
A new Remote Administration Tool for Google’s Android platform has become available in the darkest corners of the Internet. This particular type of tool is bundled into a malware package that has the ability to claim control of the devices of those who use an app that has been infected, effectively turning the unwitting smartphone or tablet into a spyware zombie.
It seems that Google may have just fallen foul of one of the pitfalls of having engineers running the company rather than people that are more adept at giving a politician's answer to some tough questions. Google's head honcho of Android, Sundar Pichai, has been in attendance at this week's Mobile World Congress, and it seems he's given a very interesting answer to a mildly interesting question.
Apple's latest breed of iOS devices do a fairly comprehensive job of ensuring that our data is protected. The long-standing Passcode feature has recently been beefed up and complimented with the introduction of Touch ID on the iPhone 5s, meaning that it's now even more difficult for malicious individuals to get access to what's on our iPhone. But what about if you require a method of determining whether or not a friend, family member, colleague or lifelong enemy has been tampering and interacting with your iPhone or iPod touch behind your back? There's now an app for that on the iOS App Store called Catchr.
A vulnerability in Snapchat, the popular photo / video IM chat app, potentially leaves iPhone users susceptible to denial-of-service (DoS) attacks, which, when carried out, may cause a device to freeze up or crash.
