Appdome has launched its novel Social Engineering Prevention service on the Appdome Platform in a bid to turn the tide against AI-powered social engineering attacks targeting Android and iOS apps. The new service will provide mobile brands with the means to not only detect and block these attacks as they occur but also allows them to intervene, thereby safeguarding users from fraud and abuse in real time.
Katie Norton, Research Manager of DevSecOps at IDC iterated the directed nature of these attacks, stating that “social engineering attacks tend to go where users are most vulnerable”. This often includes mobile apps and devices. Consequences are severe when these attacks prove successful, resulting in a clear need for solutions that can detect and prevent such attacks in the field of mobile applications.
Social engineering attacks are particularly sinister as they exploit user trust by manipulating users into disclosing personal details. The repercussions for consumers can range from account takeovers to identity theft, causing considerable financial, reputational, and emotional damage. However, with the introduction of Appdome’s new service, mobile brands now have a real-time solution to identify and intervene social engineering attacks as they occur. As Tom Tovar, co-creator and CEO of Appdome asserted, “mobile brands are taking social engineering attacks seriously,” He adds that the company aims to break the cycle of manipulation central to such attacks.
The Social Engineering Prevention service provides detection mechanisms against a number of widely used social engineering attack methods, including voice phishing (vishing) fraud, SIM swapping, trojan apps, and others. They do this by applying behavioural analysis techniques, detecting third-party apps used to remotely control mobile devices, detecting attempts to bypass biometric recognitions, and more.
This new service can be deployed in combination with any of Appdome’s 300+ mobile app security services, forging a unified front against the cost and complexity of piecing together multiple disparate technologies to form a suitable defence.
Furthermore, mobile brands have a choice of enforcement modes through Appdome’s Threat-Events in-app control framework. This allows brands to gather data on each attack, control user experience, and design functions to intervene when attacks are detected. Chris Roeckl, chief product officer at Appdome, emphasised the significance of breaking a social engineering attack as it occurs.
Instead of trying to fix the damage post-attack, “Appdome’s Social Engineering Prevention service does just that – first we stop the technical means of application or device control the attackers use, and second, we provide telemetry and intelligence to the mobile app, giving the mobile brand the power to intervene when a threat is present,” said Roeckl.
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