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Security researcher recommends your next Android phone to be Nexus or Samsung

By Cookie Monster - on 4 Jul 2016, 1:00am

Security researcher recommends your next Android phone to be Nexus or Samsung

 Image source: Samsung Mobile Singapore

If you are planning to buy an Android smartphone, cloud-based access security provider Duo Labs recommends "without major reservations" the Nexus and Samsung devices. 

Duo Labs' recommendation comes after the analysis of two critical Android vulnerabilities which were discovered by top security researcher Gal Beniamini. Earlier in May, Gal revealed how an attacker could take full control of an Android device by exploiting a Qualcomm Secure Execution Environment (QSEE) loophole. Just a few days ago, Gal uncovered another serious vulnerability where the attacker could bypass the phone's full disk encryption.

For the first vulnerability, 60% of Android devices were found to be vulnerable as they did not receive the Android monthly security update in January. It has since been patched in the May update. For the second security risk, Duo Labs reported a slight improvement where only 57% of devices were vulnerable. 

The security firm specifically mentioned the Galaxy S6, which is one of the most popular handsets in its database, to have the same level of security posture as the Nexus series. It also praised Samsung for rolling out security updates promptly.

Duo Security - "As always, we find the only Android devices that we can recommend without major reservations are Nexus and, now, Samsung devices, provided they keep releasing those security updates quickly.

It's an uphill battle to address the security risks plaguing the Android ecosystem. With so many Android devices running different hardware and software versions, it requires significant amount of resources for vendors and telcos to test new firmware and push the updates to consumers.

Well, there's another alternative solution - switch to the iPhone although the iOS platform is not immune to malware

Source: Duo Security via Android Authority

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