ID: IRCNE2011061161
Date: 2011-06-29
According to 'teckworld', Google’s Android has solved many of the security weaknesses that beset Windows but at the expense of handing a dangerous level of decision-making to users, a Symantec study has argued.
A Window into Mobile Device Security compares Android’s security architecture to that of its major rival, Apple’s iOS, and finds the latter to be superior, at least for now.
Android’s relative openness, fragmentation of different versions, weaker app vetting, and immature use of encryption all mark it down compared to iOS, but Symantec’s authors still worry that its whole security model might start to cause it major problems over time.
The problem for Android - and to some extent all mobile operating systems - is the power it hands to applications and the way users interact with them, which leaves it wide open to social engineering attacks.
The first generation of Android app attacks have also shown that apps can easily impersonate legitimate programs in order to bypass Google’s digital appsigning.
In the first half of 2011, Android has been hit by several small waves of malware which have left Google scrambling to remove problem apps from its Msrketplace. In April, software giant CA even found a fake antivirus app targeting Android users.
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