New Report On Android Security Finds Fewer Than 1% Of Phones Are Potentially At Risk

New Report On Android Security Finds Fewer Than 1% Of Phones Are Potentially At Risk
New Report On Android Security ; Photo Credit ; Fastcompany

Google recently released its 2014 Android Security Year in Review, an penetratingly data-driven report intended to bring pellucidity and transparency to the vulnerability of phones running on Android. Wow bravo,,, Its findings included: less than 0.15% of devices that only install from Google Play had a Hypothetically Harmful App (PHA)—apps that pose a threat to users or their data— installed. Overall, fewer than 1% of Android devices had a PHA installed in 2014. Apple, Microsoft, and Blackberry haven’t released similar figures. According to Fast company Analysis

New Report On Android Security Finds Fewer Than 1% Of Phones Are Potentially At Risk
 This was  smoothly achieved by Using anonymized data from 1 billion phones, Google has set the bar for Android security. Will Apple follow suit?

The report
reads more like  Developing Newfeature to allow Users Pay bills from their Gmail Account than one produced by an information technology
company. It’s an appropriate analogy: If we’ve scholarly understood anything
from the steady stream of news reports about security breaches, malware is as
inevitable as disease.
Google uses an analytic approach to
security for a practical reason beyond the company’s oft-cited fascination for
managing everything from search ads to human
resources with data analysis. From the beginning, Android was designed to leave
the choice of hardware to manufacturers like Samsung, HTC, and Motorola to
allow for innovation and competition. Mobile carriers and manufacturers bought
into Creating  a Google Gmail Account  approach shortly after the iPhone was introduced because they
wanted the common Android operating system to introduce competition and
prevent an Apple smartphone monopoly.
This resulted in a diverse, but also unpredictable, ecosystem, posing
challenges to fighting malware.

And while both are unbearable to
fully eradicate, they can be detected and managed within a population. And like
the CDC, Android security operates at scale by regularly testing over a billion
devices to predict and respond to malware infection trends.
Google splits its PHA detection
between the Google Play Store and the device. Apps submitted to the Play Store
undergo automatic testing for malware before making them available for
download. Discovery of malware relies in part on the examination of how the app
functions and partially by using giant data to forecast which apps may be
harmful. This helps detect threats on over 1 billion devices, each of which was
directs anonymized data to Google. About 200 million devices are skimmed each
day. 
New Report On Android Security Finds Fewer Than 1% Of Phones Are Potentially At Risk

 

The data uploaded from the Verify Apps provides Google with
up-to-the-minute global security status. The report points out the
source of the apps are a critical factor in blocking PHA installations.
In 2014, U.S. devices had a PHA installed on about 0.4% of devices,
about 0.2% lower than the worldwide average; users in the U.S. typically
download tested apps from the Play store. Users installing apps from
stores in other geographies such as China, Russia, and the Arab Emirates
have a much greater chance of installing a PHA.

When users circumvent  or possibly romances the Play Store security by directly loading an
app, Verify Apps—Android’s malware detection feature—will still scan it.
If malware is detected, it will enforce a multistep confirmation to
ensure the user really intends to install a PHA. Google gets a balanced
perspective of the Android’s malware susceptibility outside of the
safety of the Play Store based on the upload of the results of the scan,
and the user’s decision to install or not to install.

Recommended post ; Google Newly Updated “On-Body Detection” Smart Lock Mode in Android Seems To Be Hitting Some Devices

New Report On Android Security Finds Fewer Than 1% Of Phones Are Potentially At Risk

Just recently in the latest version, Android 5, Google’s development team has rented

technology
from SELinux kernel that mandates how apps operate safely on an Android
device. It blocks apps from taking control of system functions, like an
unauthorized app that uses the camera or microphone for a purpose
unintended by the user. It will take some time for users with devices
that have previous Android versions to get this feature since Google
can’t directly update most of its Android devices directly and relies on
mobile carriers and manufacturers to deliver these updates.

The report provides transparency into the state of Android security,
but it also may spark a movement to similar quantify mobile security
with Apple.

Technology writer, Steven Max Patterson lives in Boston and San Francisco following trends in software development platforms,
mobile, IoT, wearables and next generation television. His writing is
influenced by his 20 years experience covering or working in the
primordial ooze of tech startups. Follow him on Twitter at stevep2007.     Source ; 
fastcompany