Popular phone apps make an ideal target for data-hungry hackers
Apps of all kinds fill just about every smartphone these days, making the most popular ones ideal targets for hackers. Dating apps may be among the most widely used, making them a perfect target as a recent IBM study discovered.
The millions of people using dating apps on company smartphones could be exposing themselves and their employers to hacking, spying and theft, according to a study by International Business Machines Corp.
IBM security researchers said 26 of 41 dating apps they analyzed on Google Inc’s Android mobile platform had medium or high severity vulnerabilities, in a report published on Wednesday.
IBM did not name the vulnerable apps but said it had alerted the app publishers to problems.
Any application you put on your phone, and any program you put on your computer, holds the possibility to grant attackers access to your device, and thus everything you connect to through it. The best crisis management measure to prevent issues stemming from attacks like these is good old education. Teach people how to be safe about what they download, and how to recognize when their devices may have been compromised, and you’ll remove a large portion of potential problems.
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For more resources, see the Free Management Library topic: Crisis Management
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[Jonathan Bernstein is president of Bernstein Crisis Management, Inc., an international crisis management consultancy, author of Manager’s Guide to Crisis Management and Keeping the Wolves at Bay – Media Training. Erik Bernstein is Social Media Manager for the firm, and also editor of its newsletter, Crisis Manager]
– See more at: http://managementhelp.org/blogs/crisis-management/2015/01/31/crisis-management-lesson-you-are-always-on-camera/#sthash.jEdSGHGr.dpuf
Jonathan L. Bernstein, founder and Chairman of Bernstein Crisis Management, Inc. has more than 25 years of experience in all aspects of crisis management – crisis response, vulnerability assessment, planning, training and simulations.
Erik Bernstein is president of Bernstein Crisis Management. Erik started with BCM in 2009 as a writer and subsequently became social media manager for the consultancy itself as well as for a number of BCM clients before moving to the president position.