Mobile Quran app security vulnerabilities

The security threats and vulnerabilities of mobile Quran applications can be viewed from both developers’ and a service perspective.Similar to other apps categories like entertainment apps, games apps, banking apps and many others, understanding the threats and vulnerabilities of mobile Quran apps and the ways to manage them is crucial.With regard to the rapid transformation of many services and transactions onto mobile platforms, the security awareness of these becomes very important.Developers are responsible for ensuring that they have the necessary tools they need to build secure mobile apps which will secure and protect end user privacy and ensure reliable service delivery. Mobile Quran apps that provide features for enabling reading the Quran and interacting with other add-ons prolific events, like an easy and fast surah index list, efficient search features and many more need to be protected. Any attempt that could compromise the originality of the content of the Quran which is built for mobile apps needs to be identified.Unfortunately the security vulnerabilities within these features that convey the contents of the Quran are not clear, and there is a lack of noticeable security threats and vulnerabilities from previous studies.This paper examine the category of mobile Quran app and investigates its security threats and vulnerabilities.The outcome indicates measures to ensure that end users get the mobile Quran apps they need without compromising their privacy

Connectivity and Continuity: New Fronts in the Platform War

Device interconnectivity in video conferencing, telephony, texting, file sharing, and application handoff has become a critical battleground for tech giants. This panel compared approaches to device connectivity and application continuity, reviewed current solutions, and shared projections for the future of connectivity. Apple, Microsoft, and Google are predictably focusing on connectivity across devices and applications rather than across platforms. Given the scope of impact of these innovations, tech giants will be under increasing pressure to architect a world wherein devices and platforms are secondary to what users want to achieve via technology. Participants examined competing approaches to connectivity and continuity, explored emergent issues for research and practice, and discussed the social and business impacts of these technologies

The Dark Side(-Channel) of Mobile Devices: A Survey on Network Traffic Analysis

In recent years, mobile devices (e.g., smartphones and tablets) have met an increasing commercial success and have become a fundamental element of the everyday life for billions of people all around the world. Mobile devices are used not only for traditional communication activities (e.g., voice calls and messages) but also for more advanced tasks made possible by an enormous amount of multi-purpose applications (e.g., finance, gaming, and shopping). As a result, those devices generate a significant network traffic (a consistent part of the overall Internet traffic). For this reason, the research community has been investigating security and privacy issues that are related to the network traffic generated by mobile devices, which could be analyzed to obtain information useful for a variety of goals (ranging from device security and network optimization, to fine-grained user profiling). In this paper, we review the works that contributed to the state of the art of network traffic analysis targeting mobile devices. In particular, we present a systematic classification of the works in the literature according to three criteria: (i) the goal of the analysis; (ii) the point where the network traffic is captured; and (iii) the targeted mobile platforms. In this survey, we consider points of capturing such as Wi-Fi Access Points, software simulation, and inside real mobile devices or emulators. For the surveyed works, we review and compare analysis techniques, validation methods, and achieved results. We also discuss possible countermeasures, challenges and possible directions for future research on mobile traffic analysis and other emerging domains (e.g., Internet of Things). We believe our survey will be a reference work for researchers and practitioners in this research field.Comment: 55 page

Aportaciones para la mejora de la usabilidad en aplicaciones móviles de comunicación social

La presente Tesis Doctoral se enmarca en el auge en el uso de las aplicaciones de mensajería instantánea móvil (denominadas MIM) para dispositivos móviles inteligentes (o smartphones) y motivado por los diferentes estudios científicos que señalan los problemas de usabilidad que este tipo de aplicaciones presentan. Para ello, se ha realizado una evaluación sistemática de la usabilidad (con la aplicación de métodos de inspección de la usabilidad: análisis de tareas y evaluación heurística) de las aplicaciones MIM que actualmente se pueden encontrar en el mercado de las dos principales plataformas móviles (iOS y Android). Con los problemas de usabilidad detectados en ambas plataformas se ha propuesto un conjunto de recomendaciones de usabilidad para su aplicación en el diseño de aplicaciones MIM. Tras esta fase de evaluación y propuesta, se ha creado un prototipo de aplicación MIM para la plataforma Android que incorpora dicho conjunto de recomendaciones de usabilidad. El prototipo ha sido evaluado con métodos de inspección de la usabilidad para, tras una valoración satisfactoria, proceder a un experimento controlado con usuarios reales (en este experimento, los participantes han realizado una serie de actividades con el prototipo y un grupo de aplicaciones MIM existentes con buenos resultados de usabilidad derivados de las evaluaciones iniciales), que ha dado como resultado la validación de las recomendaciones de usabilidad para su uso en este tipo de aplicaciones. Como conclusiones, además de (1) la propuesta y validación de las recomendaciones de usabilidad para su aplicación en el contexto de la mensajería instantánea, se pueden extraer algunas conclusiones de la realización de esta investigación: (2) definición formal de las actividades que definen a una aplicación de mensajería instantánea, (3) ratificación de la existencia de problemas de usabilidad en las aplicaciones MIM actuales, (4) confirmación de que los buenos diseños de UI tienen un efecto positivo en el rendimiento de los usuarios de estas aplicaciones y (5) revelación de que son los propios contactos cercanos del usuario los que actúan como el ancla para que el usuario permanezca en la aplicación MIM (pese a tener disconformidades con la aplicación)

Mobile Health Applications: Background Research and Best Practices

This capstone was developed with the Patient Experience Department at Maine Medical Center (MMC) and an interdisciplinary MMC Tools and Technologies group. This research and analysis explores and outlines the foundations and best practices for mobile health (mHealth) applications (apps) across the spectrum of healthcare. mHealth apps used at some of the top rated hospitals in the country were selected and studied as possible templates for a similar initiative at MMC

Business and Marketing Plan for the Walk N’ Text Mobile Application

Mobile Instant Messaging is now witnessing the same explosive growth as Short Message Service did in 2000. Since texting is becoming a common form of communication, walking and texting has resulted in increased risk of associated injuries. The smartphone mobile application, Walk N’ Text, was conceived with the idea of mitigating those risks. The intention is to implement distinct functionalities to achieve this goal. Functions such as a transparent background and Augmented Reality will work continuously and cohesively to guide the users to safety. This report explores the challenges the development of such an application will face, begins to create a financial break-even analysis and explores what it would take to market the product. It does so against a background of a business wanting to explore the development of apps without currently having any in-house competencies. It concludes that the market is possibly viable but the sponsor would need to manage two main challenges: managing the development and converting awareness of the problem into an apps purchase

Why Do People Adopt, or Reject, Smartphone Password Managers?

People use weak passwords for a variety of reasons, the most prescient of these being memory load and inconvenience. The motivation to choose weak passwords is even more compelling on Smartphones because entering complex passwords is particularly time consuming and arduous on small devices. Many of the memory- and inconvenience-related issues can be ameliorated by using a password manager app. Such an app can generate, remember and automatically supply passwords to websites and other apps on the phone. Given this potential, it is unfortunate that these applications have not enjoyed widespread adoption. We carried out a study to find out why this was so, to investigate factors that impeded or encouraged password manager adoption. We found that a number of factors mediated during all three phases of adoption: searching, deciding and trialling. The study’s findings will help us to market these tools more effectively in order to encourage future adoption of password managers