The Zen of Mobile
By Evan Schuman
Should IT buy the new iPhone 12 Pro? Almost certainly not
When it comes to whether enterprise IT should seriously consider this purchase — for those operations where BYOD hasn't yet alleviated the need to buy phones ever again — it doesn't make sense for most.
Zoom's new encryption approach is incremental, but better
Max Krohn, Zoom's head of security engineering, detailed what users need to give up to get the better encryption protection that's coming.
How IT can use COVID-19 mobile crowdsourcing data to safeguard workers
Mobile apps galore have used crowdsourcing techniques this year to fight COVID-19. Now, a new app wants to build on those efforts by identifying communities (often down to the Zip Code) that are being aggressive or lenient in...
Dual biometrics for banking: Double trouble or super-secure?
Two European banks are looking to boost security by layering a pair of biometric authentication methods – facial recognition and palm recognition – atop one another. That could mean more security, or more headaches for users.
Apple Watch's planned handwashing reminder feature? I don't trust it
When Apple rolled out its planned changes for iOS 14 and its companion WatchOS 7, it included a variety of interesting tweaks. Two stood out as especially interesting: a COVID-friendly Watch handwashing app and an...
Is 7-Eleven's mobile app a way to minimize COVID exposure?
Efforts by people to avoid getting COVID-19 are already affecting mobile payments, particularly contactless NFC payments. Since shoppers now want to avoid going inside stores, even briefly, app payments that happen far away from a POS...
Mobile security forces difficult questions
As governments consider COVID-19 contact tracing and its privacy implications, it's not a bad idea for companies to take the opportunity to look more closely at their mobile agreements with employees.
Mobile payments may soar, thanks to COVID-19
One of the most frequently asked questions these days is "When will things get back to normal?" And the fair and valid answers are generally "They won't. Good-bye handshakes" and "In stages, ending when a vaccine is approved and...
Telecommuting in a post-COVID U.S. will be radically different. And that's a very good thing.
IT execs need to start talking with other C-levels now and figure out what they want their post-COVID company to look like.
Amid the pandemic, MFA's shortcomings are clearer than ever
The pandemic means there is no time for security niceties, such as properly processing RFPs for apps that were thoroughly vetted. That brings us to MFA and why it has to be radically re-envisioned.
Automated car happenings: Better lane tracking, but can you trust it?
Autonomous and semiautonomous vehicles are making serious progress, but they are going to run head on into a massive obstacle: human trust.
Will pay by palm be a thing? Should it be?
Amazon is experimenting with a way to allow shoppers to use a palm-print biometric to authenticate payments and to do so in physical stores far beyond Amazon-owned brick-and-mortars. Amazon is reportedly looking at QSRs (quick-service...
University's mobile app streaming idea has enterprise IT potential. But, oh yes, there's that security annoyance.
Purdue University has an interesting mobile concept, a means to free up lots of space that is now housing apps and app data. Why not, the university asks, stream the apps themselves from the cloud?
Mobile security: Worse than you thought
The latest Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report eloquently argues that aside from wireless, the form factor of mobile in and of itself poses security risks.
When does protecting privacy morph into invading privacy?
Employees and consumers are being more careful about sharing information that goes beyond strict need-to-know. We ran into one company that seems to not get that.
How bad can text security be? One company just showed us.
A massive number of text messages were stored in plaintext, with no security at all.
Facebook's iOS 'bug' secretly filmed users. IT, take note.
And a very different bug, planted by cyberthieves, presents even more frightening camera-spying issues with Android.
Mobile security perceptions don't approach reality. And that's a problem.
The best security approaches — such as continuous authentication — are invisible to the user and therefore frictionless. That's good in practice, but it can be bad in terms of customer perception. If they don't see it, they assume...
A revealing iPhone 11 headache
Sometimes, a mobile glitch is indicative of a much more pervasive issue. Our columnist's recent iPhone 11 iTunes headache perfectly illustrates how Apple's heralded focus on customer experience falls apart when doing upgrades.
The courts have ruled: Mobile sites must be accessible. But why did enterprises ever resist?
Although this decision should end the debate and make it clear to companies that sites must be coded to be fully compatible—and, no, throwing in a toolbar option doesn't do it—it's astounding that companies ever resisted it.
