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Ten tips to protect your mobile phone

By Liron Segev
Johannesburg, 14 Apr 2014

You have been hacked! You have a virus! Your data is stolen!

These are headlines we are used to seeing when it comes to our computers. However, as our mobile phones are smarter and have just as much connectivity and access to our digital lives, hackers are now attacking the mobile phones as ways to steal our information. While most of us have an anti-virus on our computers, how many of us have an anti-virus on our mobile phone or tablet?

Typically, the answer is none. But why not?

Our mobile phone has access to e-mail, access to the Internet, access to social media, access to not-so-kosher Web sites, access to download applications, access to not-so-kosher downloaded files... and yet we don't seem to think we need to protect our mobile devices from the bad guys.

This was a hard lesson a client learnt as his mobile phone and 13 of his staff's phones were used as the gateway to not only access personal information from the devices, but used to access his confidential company network files too.

If you think you are not a target for hackers, you are dead wrong. Hackers are out to steal identities. Steal profiles. Steal information. Your mobile phone is packed with the nuggets they need. They also know that most people simply do not protect their phones, and so it's easy pickings.

Would you be happy if a stranger would rummage through your personal photos of your family, read your e-mails, view your calendar with your appointments, and know where your house is? If the answer is no, then check out these tips.

Ten tips to protect your mobile phone:

Remember, these tips apply to tablets too, so don't forget to keep them secure, because if tablets have WiFi ability and/or a SIM card, then they are just as much of a target as the phone!

1. Anti-virus

Don't be stingy and go spend a little bit of money to buy a decent mobile anti-virus application. For the same price as a movie ticket, you can protect your mobile device from all those nasty applications that are infecting your phone and stealing data without your knowledge.

Each mobile operating system has at least one anti-virus application. For my Android devices, I use Kaspersky Internet Security for Android, which costs R108.95 per year. Ryan Cane from Twitter uses Sophos for Android, which is free [thanks for the tip].

2. Lock the phone

Set a password/passcode/lock pattern on your device so that every time it comes out of standby mode, it asks for that passcode. Yes, this can be a pain, but if you lose your phone, the pain of knowing that a stranger is going through your kids' photos or your spouse's e-mail is worse.

3. Lock the SIM card

When you buy your SIM card it comes with a PIN. The phone allows you to remove that PIN. This is a bad idea. Leave the SIM card PIN in place so that if your phone is rebooted by an unauthorised person they can't just make calls. They also can't take your SIM and put it into a call centre modem and make literally thousands of rands worth of calls before you are able to report that SIM as missing.

4. Official apps

While not perfect, the official app stores do a good job of screening rogue apps. If you are on Android or BlackBerry, avoid installing apps from any Web site that is not the official store. Typically, hackers would download the official apps and add a wrapper around the app to add their malicious code. They would then upload the typically paid-for app onto a file sharing Web site and wait for you to download it. You think you are getting a free app, but you are just enabling malicious code to run on your device.

5. Unsecure WiFi

As tempting as it is to hook onto some random free WiFi, don't do it! It is very easy to set up a free WiFi hotspot and get information from people who try to use it to connect to the Internet. Check out what I did during my Ruckus WiFi Challenge!

If you don't want to use your mobile data, and you travel a lot, then sign up with a provider like AlwaysON and use their WiFi network. They are available virtually everywhere and offer a great service. Incidentally, if you have a Samsung device, you quality for 1GB of free WiFi per month!

6. No place like home

Literally! Stop putting your home address into the phone. More and more apps are requesting this to be able to assist you in navigation and information about your surroundings. However, if the phone does fall into the wrong hands, they will have access to your home address. [By the way, this applies to your car's GPS too].

If you must have an address, at least put in the home address of somewhere down the road from you. You can still navigate accurately, but it doesn't lead the bad people to your front door.

7. App permissions

When you install an app, it will tell you what it is going to do on your phone. We usually just tap on the 'accept' button without reading the screen. If you look, it tells you that the app wants to use your phone to send an SMS or read your location or read your e-mail. Unless the app needs to do it, don't allow it. Think logically - is there a real reason for a game to need to read your SMS? I think not.

8. Remote protection

All mobile platforms have a remote system that allows you to take over the phone and wipe the phone remotely. Typically, this is free and just needs to be enabled. Do it now. Do it on all your family's phones. Not only can you retain control of your data and nuke it in case the phone is stolen, but these apps have the ability to locate your phone too. Good for the police and also good for you to use to try work out where you left your phone. Before you wipe it, look to see if you haven't left it at a friend's house.

9. Backup to the cloud

Apps like iCloud, DropBox, OneDrive, and Google Drive allow you to automatically make a copy of your pics and other information from your phone - just enable it. You can also set it to only backup when you are in your WiFi zone so no need to worry about huge mobile data bills.

10. Update. Update

It is so important I wrote it twice. Make sure you keep your phone's operating system up to date by checking for the latest software. Most phones allow you to do this by tapping into 'Setting', 'About the Phone' and tapping on 'Check for Updates'.

Also, don't forget to update your apps. Sometime the developer discovers a hole in its coding and it will release an update to close that hole. If you are up to date then hackers can't exploit that hole and get access to your info.

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