How Secure is Your Smart Phone?

August 6th, 2009 by Michael Brancato | located in Tips and Tricks | trackback

Have you ever put your phone down in a busy restaurant and ALMOST forgotten to pick it up again after paying the check? Or felt your pockets just before exiting a cab or airport security check and noticed you’d left your phone behind? These specific scenarios might not strike a chord of recognition with everyone, but most people I know have either lost a mobile phone or come close to losing one at one time or another.

In the past, losing a mobile phone—or worse, having yours stolen—may not have been a big deal (beyond the phone itself, would-be thieves might gain some personal phone numbers and make some unauthorized calls). But today’s era of smart phones and business mobility raises the security stakes significantly. For mobile business users, a lost or stolen mobile phone is more than just the absence of the device itself. It’s the loss of important, often competitively sensitive information—recent strategic emails and phone messages to sales contacts, for example, and even access to corporate database systems.

So how do you protect yourself? Awareness is the best defense against identity theft, fraud, and trade espionage. The more you know, the better you can prepare yourself for the unexpected. The following tips might just help keep you safer than sorrier:

1. Make sure mobile business users know the risks and understand the need to secure their devices.
2. Use passwords to secure access to your mobile phone.
3. Use encryption when possible to secure data.
4. Use software firewalls, patch management, antivirus and antispyware software.
5. Use a belt clip or purse lease to attach your phone to you physically when travelling.

Got your own ideas for protecting mobile data? Let us know your thoughts.

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