Use ios
- I think Apple does more checks and suitable ones compared to Google. I think Apple has a higher reputation for Security on it's products, app store than Google
Whether the above about ios vs Google Play is fair or not needs clarifying. But some sources from a quick search:
“The risk of malicious apps tends to be higher on Android because it’s
a more open operating system. It’s incredibly difficult to download an
app that isn’t from the Apple App Store on an iOS device, which is one
of the benefits of the company’s walled garden approach.
“Malicious mobile apps usually appear innocuous, but run malicious
code in the background that can spy on the individual and everything
they do on their device,” Schless went on to say.
https://www.trustedreviews.com/news/mobile-news/are-iphones-more-secure-than-android-phones-4205231 Date: 2022
"Android’s open Google Play Store marketplace has far more apps to
choose from than on Apple's App Store, but there’s a far greater
chance that hackers can make it onto the platform to distribute
malware through malicious apps.
On numerous occasions, highly ranked apps with hundreds of thousands
of downloads from the Google Play Store have been discovered to
contain Android malware.
Android users can also change their settings to allow apps from
outside of the Google Play Store. This provides an even greater
selection of apps, but opens users to an even greater risk of
downloading a malicious app. Apple's secure App Store wins comfortably
on this front.
As a side note, make sure to avoid third party app stores; while the
Play Store and the App Store have their faults, they're both much
safer than the many unofficial app marketplaces elsewhere online."
https://nordvpn.com/blog/ios-vs-android-security/ - Date 2022
"Android operating system Popularity: The Android operating system is
hugely popular. This means that developers are constantly building
new apps designed to run on the system. That’s good for users ...
mostly. The problem comes when hackers create apps designed to infect
your mobile devices.
There is an app review process for Google Play. Unfortunately, the process is far less stringent than what developers face when adding
apps to Apple’s App Store.
It's easier, then, for malicious apps to sneak onto the Google Play
store and easier for users to accidentally install one. One of the
main issues is that the end user can go into an Android device and
enable the installation of software from unknown sources.
This means that you can install software on the Android device that
does not come from the Google PlayStore.
The software—or APK, as it’s called—can be downloaded and installed
from a website bypassing the Google PlayStore review."
emphasis added for bold
https://us.norton.com/blog/mobile/android-vs-ios-which-is-more-secure#
Date 2022
https://www.makeuseof.com/apple-vs-android-which-is-more-secure/ - Date 2022
https://www.howtogeek.com/224096/why-iphones-are-more-secure-than-android-phones/ - Date 2015
Permissions
- I keep being asked for sensor access for no reason I can see on major apps on Google Play that wasn't there as far as I know for ios
You can block the odd permissions later?, ref GraphenOS Sandboxing Google Play etc...
- Not sure this is viable for many users
ios issues/phone access to employer systems
"A well-run organization wouldn’t enable its myriad employee laptops
to access its core systems without any protection. But with our
phones, it’s all very different."
Android’s reputation for securing its fragmented ecosystem is not
good—the widely held view is that iPhone’s are much safer. But you can buy an Android and lock it down fairly easily.
Not so with an iPhone. *Apple makes its devices harder to attack, but also harder to protect.
You are reliant on Apple to do the work for you—and so, for users and
companies now under attack, Shwed warns that this has become a serious issue, that the security risks between the two platforms are
now “balanced.”
Emphasis added
There have been many more mobile vulnerabilities targeting and exploiting Android devices than iPhones in the last year—unsurprisingly; iPhones are much more secure, right?
No, Shwed, tells me. “I think the risks are for both. There are zero-day attacks and there are malware on both platforms. I think it's actually very balanced.”
His point here is interesting. If you use an Android, then the onus is on you, the user, to secure your device. There are plenty of security platforms available from leading vendors.
And they can wrapper the device. If you’re an enterprise user, then your company can do the same for you. This overcomes the issues with Android’s fragmented ecosystem, the lag in deploying security patches and general updates, the relative lack of security on the Play Store
compared to Apple’s equivalent.
But with iPhone, the onus is on Apple to keep you safe. And two urgent OS updates in the last few weeks, with some admission of
exploits being caught in the wild, clearly shows that the threat is
real.
“iPhone is a much more closed system,” Shwed says, “and Apple regulates much more what's on the platform, which theoretically or practically make it a little bit more secure. On the other hand, there is also limitation about what security software can do an iOS. So the balance may be the same.”
The extent and severity of those risks are not balanced, though. “With Android, it's much easier to develop software, to use software,
and that software can be more malicious than on iOS. But at the same
time, on Android, you can build much better security software because
the same openness exists also towards security systems.”
All of which presents a dilemma for CISO’s handling the new normal,
hybrid workforce, which will prevent reverting to walled garden, no
external access, enterprise solutions anytime soon. “In the past, you
can work remotely—in the past, it was fun to say that and we did it
small part of the time. Today it's 100% of the time.”
For Shwed, this means another new normal—no security software on your phone, no access to your company systems. “It's not very
difficult,” he says. “In Check Point, everybody using your own phone,
you're doing whatever you want. But once you want to access the
corporate email or the corporate systems, it checks that you have our
threat prevention software on your mobile phone. If you don't have it,
you can't access the system. That's very simple. Everybody installed
that software. And if they don't, they can't access the system. And
they don't risk it.”
The risk of a cyber pandemic is real—you’ll see ever more warnings over the coming months. What we’ve seen recently with expansive attacks, allied to a still fragmented workforce and new supply chains has left huge vulnerabilities.
This hasn't copied/been formatted well, needs adjustment for 3rd time...
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/zakdoffman/2021/03/16/iphone-12-pro-max-and-iphone-13-not-more-secure-than-google-and-samsung-android-warns-cyber-billionaire/
Date: Mar 16, 2021 (more than 1 year old though)
