In A survey conducted by Norton reveals that 53% of adults in India have fallen victim to mobile phone loss or theft, but despite that, only two in five Indians currently have a password protecting their devices.
The imminent need for mobile protection is increasingly important, with Indians having their phones lost/stolen an average of 1.5 times over the past five years.
As annoying as it is to lose their mobile phones, 77% of victims considered the loss of contact information the worst part of the experience and also a huge inconvenience. In fact, Indian women would rather get a root canal and the men would rather drink stale milk than lose their mobile phones, the survey revealed. It is therefore not surprising that anger was the single most dominant feeling expressed by victims of mobile theft.
Of the affected Indians, one in two was concerned about the exposure or loss of private information, with a whopping 74% noting that they could neither remotely lock nor wipe the phones memory after it was lost or stolen. This could account for 82% finding the process of resolving the situation difficult and 90% finding the experience stressful.
Not surprisingly, more than half of the victims said that they were willing to pay a ransom (an average of Rs. 3,692) to resolve the situation. However, in reality, victims end up paying nearly three times that amount (an average of Rs. 9,957) to resolve the situation. Despite this, almost 3 in 10 Indians said that the situation was never resolved and in cases where it was resolved, 12% said that it took more than a week.
Getting help is not entirely straightforward either; despite high levels of inconvenience, adults feel that only a limited number of resources are available to help in such occasions. For most Indians, mobile providers are the main source of contact, followed by family and friends.
The survey results are clear: mobile phone loss and theft is a significant issue for Indians today, said Gaurav Kanwal, Country Sales Manager, India, Consumer Products and Solutions, Symantec. As smartphones become more pervasive in our lives, there is a greater need to protect the data on such devices. This is one of the reasons why Norton is taking security beyond the PC to develop solutions that protect consumers, regardless of the device they use, he added.
The study also found that Indians are more likely to have a password if they currently own a smartphone or have lost their mobile phone or had it stolen in the past. Currently, only 42% of users in India have password-protected mobile phones - of which, 61% currently own a smartphone and another 50% were previously victims of mobile phone loss or theft.
On the whole, a significant number of Indians consider security factors before making a mobile phone purchase. 80% of adults agreed that services such as locking, wiping and locating phones remotely are important; and the same percentage would be likely to purchase software providing such a service.
Indians have some of the highest confidence levels in the region with regard to the use of software services on their mobile phones. Six out of ten Indians are comfortable allowing software on their phones to identify their location, and a similar number are comfortable with online banking. With mobile phones becoming such a central device in the lives of consumers, it is important to protect these devices, especially the data that is stored on such devices.
With an explosion in the number of mobile phones and the increasing reliance on smartphones, this means greater opportunity for cybercriminals.
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