9 Best Tips to Ensure Mobile Application Security
The dependency of humans on mobile devices and applications has reached an inevitable stage. Be it for personal use or business operations, the presence of a mobile app to manage tasks on the go has upheld convenience and comfort as two primary factors. Looking at the modern world and its requirements, a mobile app is required for shopping, ordering food, video conferencing, chatting, instant messaging, hailing cab services, mobile banking, online money transfer, live streaming of shows, and a lot more.
According to Techjury.net, mobile users have climbed by over 10 percent in the last year, and mobile devices now account for over 51 percent of all online time in the United States.
With the rapid growth of the mobile app industry, businesses and organizations around the world are adopting this technology to improve customer communications and employee productivity. However, as uses and demands for more sophisticated mobile apps have surged, so have hacking and cyber-attacks. To ensure mobile application security, it is necessary to take into account some very important factors like end-to-end encryption, zero password sharing, asymmetric keys, etc.
Developers of a competent app development company take no chance of releasing or launching the app without securing it with the latest tools and best practices that we will discuss in depth. They take care of application security along with other factors to deliver failsafe and revenue-generating apps.
Mobile Application Security Best Practices
1. APIs- Use Authorized Ones
APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) are tools that assist programmers in the development of software. APIs are an important aspect of backend development, but they may be a security nightmare because they frequently interact with the outside world. For best security, professionals advise that APIs be approved centrally.
2. Source Code Encryption
Because the majority of a native mobile app’s code is on the client-side, mobile malware may readily trace defects and vulnerabilities in the source code and design. Take, for example, the well-known Facebook, where the suspected hacking of Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’ WhatsApp account has gotten a lot of attention.
Developers should make sure their apps are sufficiently resilient to prevent attacks by reverse engineering and manipulation. Source code encryption is an ideal technique to protect your software against these threats as it ensures that it is unreadable.
3. Data Transmission Security
Data breaches and theft shall be safeguarded against sensitive information passed from the client to the server. VPNs, SSL, TLS can all help to protect transit data as well as to cipher it between source and recipient. This way mobile application security is guaranteed.
4. Employ the Current Cryptography Technique
Popular cryptographic algorithms like MD5 and SHA1 have proven ineffective for today’s security needs. It’s best not to hard code your keys, because this makes them easier to steal. Keep your keys in safe containers and don’t keep them on the device itself. For hashing, use only the most recent and reliable APIs, such as 256-bit AES encryption and SHA-256.
To achieve failsafe mobile application security, you should also perform manual penetration testing and threat modeling on your apps before they go live.
5. Frequent Testing
How nicely you have secured your app doesn’t matter because safeguarding your app is a never-ending task. New threats emerge, necessitating the development of new solutions. Before each deployment, it’s been standard practice to test your app against a set of randomly created security situations. Penetration testing, and that too repeatedly, is the key to failsafe mobile app security.
6. Reduce Permissions
To access hardware and function properly, mobile applications require different permissions. To reduce the spread of malware in mobile, it is necessary to ask for permissions that are required to access only the essential functionalities to reduce the number of connections the app has.
7. Non-Reliability on Third-Party Libraries
Developers usually incorporate some freely available code portions to accomplish their coding tasks. But it is important to understand that these codes are not always safe to incorporate. The GNU C Library, for example, has a security weakness that has enabled hackers to run malicious code remotely and damage a system. To safeguard their apps from library vulnerabilities, developers should use restricted internal repositories and implement policy controls during procurement.
8. Tamper Protection
There have been numerous instances of rip-off apps being downloaded from app stores. Tamper protection is a necessity for security in Android apps because they are easily reverse-engineered.
There are a variety of techniques to tamper-proof an Android app, so employ one or more of them to secure your users.
9. Use of Multi-factor Authentication
Hackers get a golden opportunity to access confidential data if there is no authentication step for extra security. Users easily can fall prey to malicious activities, resulting in the loss of their sensitive data. Multifactor authentication is a strong weapon in the fight against cyber-crimes. To sign into a device or app, multifactor authentication requires entering a secret code in addition to the password. This code can be sent via text message, biometric system, email, or Google Authenticator.
Final Say
Developing mobile applications is a huge task. Building an app as well as taking into account its security is a simultaneous task to safeguard and protect the application from malware and malicious activities. Desktop apps are now a matter of the past because mobile apps are rapidly taking their place. The above-mentioned tips are very important to consider while building from simple to complex apps because these tips give the assurance of safe access to the applications.
Apptread is a leading and recognized innovative app development company, which takes care of each aspect of your requirements and puts its efforts to turn your app idea into a unique and profitable reality. So, let’s connect over a free session to share your requirements and concerns and get strategic ideas for further actions.
