Mobile devices: Are you concerned about security?
- July 29, 2010 10:48 AM |
- By POV
A man looks at different applications on his iPhone. (Jeff Chiu/Associated Press)
Many free smartphone applications pull sensitive data off users' devices and ship them to third parties without notification, according to a mobile phone security firm.
Lookout Inc. scanned nearly 300,000 free applications for Apple Inc.'s iPhone and phones built around Google Inc.'s Android software. It found that nearly a quarter of the iPhone apps and almost half the Android apps contained software code that contained those data-mining capabilities.
The data can include details about users' contacts, their pictures, text messages and internet and search histories. The third parties can include advertisers and companies that analyze data on users.
The information is used by companies to target ads and learn more about their users. The danger, though, is that the data become vulnerable to hacking and use in identity theft if the third party isn't careful about securing the information.
With files from The Associated Press
Are you concerned about the security of your mobile phones and devices? Has your data ever been hacked or stolen? Let us know.
(This poll is not scientific. It is based on readers' responses.)Categories
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