How safe are messaging apps

With the massive rise in popularity of messaging apps in the past few years with Snapchat said to have at least 30 million active monthly users while WhatsApp and LINE sport 400 million and 300 million registered users, respectively. The ever increasing risk of cyber attacks against such accounts and there retrospective servers is a given. The issue with a lot of these apps is they request a mountain of personal information in order for you to be able to use the service. Giving this information requires a lot of trusting of the application developer and from past exploits its hard to say a lot of these developers deserve your trust. The question now is "how do you protect yourself whilst using such application?"

Well in order to help you with this I have compiled a number of steps that if followed should help minimize your risk of exposure if your account becomes victim to a cyber attack.

1) Be discreet. If you want to use messaging apps as a way to contact certain people, avoid using real-life identification details that can be traced back to you. If that can’t be avoided, use as little real information as possible, depending on the app you’re using. Avoid linking your social networking profiles to your messaging app accounts.

2) Secure your messaging app accounts. Use a unique email account for your messaging app. Don’t reuse passwords.

3) Don’t share anything you wouldn’t want the public to get wind of. Oversharing is one of the biggest mistakes you can ever make online; using messaging apps is no exception. Be aware of what you share. And when in doubt, keep sensitive information to yourself.

4) Limit what access you give your messaging application eg don't give access to your location or photos unless you need to.

Securing your android (the basics)

I have been asked a bit lately about securing android devices as I tend to focus on the apple side of things as I myself use the iPhone. There is a myth out there that android is inherently insecure and this really isn't true, android out of the box is pretty good its the user that make the device insecure. The real issue with android is anyone can make an app and upload it to their store they don't check first to see if you are a potential cyber criminal. I think from memory that at one stage in the past few years the top 5 apps in the android store were in fact trojan horses this might be wrong but I am pretty sure their is some truth their I need to go back and double check this. So to minimize the waffle you ask "what do I need to do to secure my android?" Well I have put together a number of steps that if followed will definitely help you get to a place where you can feel "secure".

1) Do not save all of your passwords in your device! I don't know why I need to say this but people naturally tend to save their passwords for easy access of whatever the reason on their devices. This is a very bad practice and you should avoid this, think of memorizing your passwords of a way to delaying Alzheimer's and not getting ripped off by cyber criminals.

2) Use your devices inbuilt security features, If you are running on Jelly Bean, you can have a screen lock and encryption enabled to further enhance your security. Use these features they will help you keep your device safe.

3) Androids allow you to lock your apps you should use this feature especially for apps that hold sensitive information. Their is a free app that you can download to enable this feature called App Lock.

4) If you are installing an app read what permissions the app want's!!! If you are downloading some recipe app it doesn't need access to your camera, microphone and contacts. This should be common sense but for some reason people download apps and click ok to everything.

5)  Download a mobile security app, androids are very much open to virus's and malware in comparison to their i0S counterparts. An app I think is pretty good is avast!mobile security.

6) One of the most important things you can do to secure your android is secure your network. I know you wont listen but try to avoid using public networks. You can protect your information by using apps like Hideninja VPN so that your outgoing connection is always encrypted, making it harder for anyone to sabotage your data. If you suspect that your device is being attacked, WiFi Protector can help fend off these attackers. To further enhance your network security you can apply settings from SecDroid but note that this app is only for rooted phones.