Androïd for smartphones : what about security

Hello,

What do you think about Androïd for smartphones in terms of security and privacy ?

Are there some arguments that tends to orientate the customer to other systems ?

Truely yours.

 

Due to its popularity android is probably the most targeted platform at the moment which would give people a good reason to switch to alternatives. Add to that the loose restrictions that google has implemented in android and the market place and it makes it a prime target for hackers.
Now apple on the other hand puts a lot of restrictions in ios and the app store which helps make it more secure but even they have malware and exploits so no one is completely safe.

 

Android as an OS is secure in that an attack on your applications is unlikely - they're locked in a sandbox and Java is a fairly secure language so exploits won't be as easy to find (typically) as they would be in C/C++, which is iOS's primary language.

That said, Android is susceptible to socially engineered malware as their Market is very open.

At the moment malware on Android is a load of hype - it's really not nearly as bad as people think. We've only very recently begun to see actual malware in the form of premium SMS apps. The rest have been more of a "POC" testing the waters sorta deal.

Android 4.0 is also including ASLR, which is important since the Linux layer seems to be the more vulnerable part.

 

Thank you for your answers.