Smartphone and Tablet Users Prone to Cyber Attack and Vulnerable to Hacking

Featured Image Caption: Cyber Attack

One in six smartphone users have fallen prey to cyber attack, reveals a new study. 60% of smartphone users and half of tablet users are vulnerable to hacking.

People may think that their shiny smart phones and tablets are safe from hackers and malware software. But that isn’t the actual case.

According to the new study, One out of six tablet device as well as smartphone users have fallen into the prey to a cyber attack. The study has also found that nearly 60% of the smartphone users as well as nearly half of the tablet users are found to be vulnerable to hacking, as these devices don’t have any protection software.

Hacking can be anything, right from the phishing emails resulting in the fraudster to take over the online account, session hijacking attacks resulting in the interruption of the users’ web browsing, monitored or even hijacked etc. Smartphone and tablet devices users have no protection against ‘malware’ which is software designed specifically to damage or disrupt a system,

According to Eisen, the rapid increase in demand for online banking and retail in conjunction of less security on devices has created a massive opportunity for cyber criminals leaving many people and businesses extremely vulnerable.

The study has also noted that Smartphone users are unaware with the fact that their expensive devices could be target of mobile malware. On determining the world of mobile malware, it has been observed that Android platform has become top attack vector for cyber criminals.

People are using their devices for online banking, credit card purchase as well as storing other personal information. As the criminals want to get control on victim’s bank account, credit card numbers, or any identities, they perform this by re purposing older malware and viruses that were designed for PCs.