Pitfalls of developing mobile banking application
There is an active development of mobile technologies. The modern business requirements are such that access to information should be carried out quickly, reliably, and from anywhere in the world. Payment apps are no exception. And they are gradually appearing on our mobile devices (smartphones, tablets, etc.). Mobile devices have not yet been sufficiently studied. And each mobile OS (Android, iOS, Windows Phone, Symbian, BlackBerry, etc.) has its own specifics. So in each of them, you can find a large number of both new vulnerabilities and well-known ones. Experienced mobile banking app developers always take this into consideration.
Types of mobile banking apps
The “no account access” category includes programs that perform only auxiliary work. These functions may also be present in applications that have the ability to work with an account. Often a mobile application evolves from a simple navigation application to an account-based application. Some banks, on the contrary, prefer to distribute these functions to several applications. From the main point of view, it is correct. If a critical application is not overloaded with unnecessary functionality, the number of attack vectors available to an attacker decreases.
Main disadvantages
As you can see, there are plenty of advantages of mobile banking. But you shouldn’t give in to the illusion of impeccability. The fact is that there are many factors that limit the rapid growth of financial and mobile technologies. Today, many banks are actively developing this area of activity, but many problems remain open.
For example, the following problems of Mobile Banking can be highlighted:
- Organizational and legislative base. It is planned that during the formation of this structure, all those who take part in the mobile banking market will be centralized. These structures, according to the announced plans, will take over the function of exercising control over mobile payments, which include mobile banking;
- Low acceptance in the banking environment. Despite the improvement of mobile technologies, they are very skeptical about the mobile banking segment. Nevertheless, 80% of banks provide mobile banking services. But customers only get access to limited functionality. That is, most of the useful functions are unreasonably cut. However, recently, many banking organizations, realizing the prospects and need for a mobile bank, are gradually expanding the capabilities of their service systems;
- Technological backwardness. For example, only a few banks provide full-fledged mobile banking for iPhone, iPad and Android.
- Security guarantees. No matter what efforts are made by information security specialists, the “holes” both exist and will continue to exist. And the main problem is not in the protection systems. And the fact is that in most cases, threats arise through the fault of the clients themselves. It often does not realize the risks from its own actions. That is, users simply do not know how to use the mobile bank correctly. It is planned that in the future such problems will be eliminated through the development of systems. They are used for scanning the face of the owner of a mobile device, fingerprints, voice recognition, etc. All this will be, but it will take time and money. Since the use of such technologies is possible only on modern devices, which can also cost a lot of money.
Each mobile OS has its own specifics, and each of them contains a large number of both new and well-known vulnerabilities. And while developing a mobile banking application these details must be considered.
