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Increasing performance of mobile devices along with today’s mobile subscribers’ higher levels of adoption for mobile apps has encouraged developers to produce powerful mobile applications. Because of the complexities in the mobile apps development and competitive pressures, apps developers are sometimes turning a nelson eye towards conforming to established app development standards. As a result, apps produced are prone to issues like inefficiencies in end user experience, interruptions and interferences with phone operation and network resources, mala fide intentions, and resultant vulnerabilities such as attacks by worms, Trojans and other malware. This can lead to serious implications, including identity theft, phishing, confidential data leaks, decreased service usage and regulatory issues.
Issues: Apps and security
Smartphones are personal devices that contain sensitive information, and hence the security of these phones is of utmost importance. Like the personal computer, smartphones are sophisticated and capable of performing complex tasks but are also prone to a variety of security attacks, such as phishing, which can compromise user information.
In November 2009, popular game developer Storm8 was accused of using a backdoor method to collect and transmit the wireless phone numbers of the iPhones on which its games are installed. Storm8 games have been downloaded 20 million times on the Apple App Store. Storm8 is facing a federal law suit in District Court in Northern California.
In May 2011, it was found that Android users running apps over an unsecured Wi-Fi network run the risk of having their authentication tokens swiped by eavesdroppers. Those tokens can be used to view and tamper with your contacts, calendars, e-mail and other information. This vulnerability has affected all smartphone’s running Android 2.3.3 or earlier versions – which accounts for 99.7% of Android devices.
Apps and reliability
Reliability of mobile applications has been a cause for concern for mobile subscribers. There have been instances in the past year where smartphones have been subjected to attacks that compromised the security and privacy of the end user.
In March 2011, Google removed more than 50 applications infected by DroidDream Malware as it compromised personal data. The infected applications existed in the Android Market for at least four days and were downloaded between 50,000 and 250,000 times onto Android devices.
And Android is not the only platform affected by malicious software. In November 2009, iPhone users in Australia were targeted by self-replicating attacks that display an image of 1980s singer Rick Astley. In 2010, there were spyware (FlexiSpy, Mobile Spy, MobiStealth and SpyBubble) targets towards Research In Motion’s BlackBerry, which posed risk to confidentiality and integrity of corporate data.
Each of these instances has led to consequences for mobile operators and retailers. These breaches of privacy position the app storefront as a platform for the distribution of viruses, spyware, malware and other attacks, leaving the end user with a loss of trust in the mobile apps marketplace and leading to customer churn for the mobile operator.
Apps, interruption and interference
To maximize the mobile apps experience, it is essential (read: table stakes) to ensure optimal performance regardless of the type of handset, operating system, location and network provider against potential contributing factors such as battery life, CPU usage, etc. In the recent past there have been numerous instances where poor quality of third party applications has had a significant impact on the resource utilization of the smartphones and mobile networks leading to interruption and interference.
According to Sanjay Jha, CEO of Motorola Mobility, 70% of the Motorola Android phones are returned, as the poor quality of third party apps affected the resources of the phone thus leading to issues in battery life and CPU performance. For example, when released at the first instance, the official Google+ app affected the battery performance, draining the battery – which would otherwise last for two days – in merely five hours.
Inefficiencies in capping data harvesting of Microsoft’s Windows Phone e-mail client for Yahoo Mail resulted in a phantom data glitch, where the users were hit with higher-than-usual data charges, resulting from phones transmitting and downloading data without users’ knowledge.
Finally, the APP Genome Project analyzed more than 500,000 Android and iOS applications and found that many applications have “data-harvesting” capabilities that aren’t revealed by the developer.
Apps, usability and end-user experience
The features of mobile devices and wireless networks pose significant challenges for examining usability of mobile apps, including mobile context, multimodality, connectivity, limited processing capability and power and restrictive data entry methods amongst the many.
Mob4Hire, in their research, report that 89% of app users experienced mobile app crashes. Another U.K. survey found that three of the most downloaded “generic” barcode scanning apps only achieved a 9% hit-rate for accurate results.
Solution
To address issues around security, reliability, resource utilization and usability, mobile operators with their own app stores are looking at testing and certification of apps as gate-entry criteria for offering of apps to subscribers. Such programs would provide a specialized, reliable and alternative to existing inadequate quality practices.
Additionally, apps care programs can help MNOs manage subscribers’ reporting of mobile app issues and provide “triage” support services. Such programs will help to address the implications of loyalty, reducing churn and complete control of experience and also increase app education and customer support.
These in-life management programs will not only improve the quality of mobile apps, but also time-to-market, optimizing ROI, ensure the scalability and reliability of the mobile app ecosystem and create revenue streams for mobile operators worldwide.
