Though the mobile payment industry is a trillion-dollar industry, there is still distrust and skepticism over its security. There have been a lot of reports about security breaches and hackers that scare a lot of people from trying or using mobile payment systems. To protect themselves, people limit their exposure to such by not sharing personal financial information online.
Current technologies have gone to great lengths to ensure the security of mobile transactions. Terminology like encryption, near-field communication (NFC), magnetic secure transmission (MST), or tokenization may seem highfalutin to a common Joe but these have become commonplace in the world of mobile payments.
Because of the lightspeed growth of the mobile payment industry, software developers, retailers, and financial institutions collaborate to find ways to keep mobile payment systems safe from security breaches. There are sets of application program interfaces (APIs) used for such a purpose. While a lot of effort is poured into securing mobile payments, consumers have to be aware of how mobile payments systems become risky. This is needed because paying by phone is on the rise. More and more people do it, and more ore more websites allow it – there is even such at thing as a pay by phone casino.
Losing your phone
Your mobile phone contains a lot of personal information about you. It is also the primary gadget you use for mobile payments. When you lose your phone, you expose yourself to various security breaches, and online financial accounts is one of them. To protect yourself, make sure you use a two-step authentication process, which requires a PIN and a biometric scan, when accessing account details or any online transaction on your mobile phone.
Hacked mobile wallets
When you create a mobile wallet, your credit card details are encrypted. An additional layer of security is added by providers by not letting merchants see your financial account details. Instead, randomly generated tokens are sent to process mobile transactions. What exposes you to hackers is the use of public Wi-Fi when you add credit card details to your mobile wallet. These cybercriminals prowl public networks for such opportunities and quickly take advantage of them to fool you into registering your account details into a fake mobile wallet they created. To keep yourself out of harm’s way, always use your own Wi-Fi network when managing your mobile wallet. If you need to do it out of your home, always use a virtual personal network (VPN).
Hacked phones
Cybercriminals use malware to hijack mobile phones. Mobile malware is an undeniable threat in today’s day and age. Whenever you receive links from unknown sources, never click on it. At times, you have to double check the credentials of the sender as some may impersonate addresses from your contact list or merchants. In addition, it is best to arm your phone with anti-virus software.
While none of these are totally foolproof, they are not entirely susceptible. Others ways to keep mobile payments secure is to change your password every so often and to make them strong, update your apps, and only go on secure and trusted sites.
