{"id":12106,"date":"2018-04-24T02:30:18","date_gmt":"2018-04-24T10:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2018\/04\/24\/news-5875\/"},"modified":"2018-04-24T02:30:18","modified_gmt":"2018-04-24T10:30:18","slug":"news-5875","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/2018\/04\/24\/news-5875\/","title":{"rendered":"The best privacy and security apps for Android"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Credit to Author: JR Raphael| Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2018 03:00:00 -0700<\/strong><\/p>\n

Let’s get one thing out of the way right off the bat: If you’re looking for recommendations about Android security suites or other malware-scanning software, you’ve come to the wrong place.<\/p>\n

Why? Because, like most people who closely study Android, I don’t recommend<\/a> using those types of apps at all. Android malware isn’t the massive real-world threat it’s frequently made out to be, and Google Play Protect<\/a> and other native Android features<\/a> are more than enough<\/a> to keep most devices safe.<\/p>\n

There are, however, some areas where third-party apps can add valuable layers onto your Android security picture<\/a>. They’re less about fighting off theoretical boogeymen<\/a> and more about proactively protecting your accounts and data.<\/p>\n

These are the actions that will actually boost privacy and security on your Android device, and the apps I’d suggest installing for each:<\/p>\n

Your passwords are the gatekeepers to your digital life \u2014 for the foreseeable future<\/a>, at least \u2014 and it’s up to you to make sure they’re properly armed. The secret? Let a password manager serve as your muscle. A good password manager makes it easy to create and maintain strong, unique passwords for however many apps, sites, and services you use.<\/p>\n

And on Android, LastPass is the cream of the crop. I recently deemed it to be the best all-around password manager for Android<\/a> \u2014 and for good reason: It’s thoughtfully designed, simple to use, and effective as can be at securely storing your credentials and allowing you to sign in anywhere a password is required.<\/p>\n

Once LastPass learns (or creates) your various sign-ins, it’ll pop up a box with autofill info anytime you’re prompted to sign into a service \u2014 be it through an app or on a website within your favorite Android browser. All you have to do is touch your finger to your phone’s fingerprint sensor, confirm the credentials you want to use, and that’s it: LastPass handles the rest.<\/p>\n

LastPass takes the pain out of creating and then using complex passwords all across Android.<\/p>\n

LastPass works equally well on the desktop and seamlessly syncs your info across multiple devices and platforms (using its own secure cloud storage and device-level encryption). Its core features are completely free, while a $24-a-year premium subscription will get you expanded storage space for notes and documents, the ability to use YubiKey<\/a> and Sesame<\/a> as two-factor authentication methods, and the ability to create an emergency access plan that’d give someone else access to your account after an extended period of inactivity.<\/p>\n

Family plans, team plans, and enterprise plans are also available<\/a> for $48 a year, $29 per user per year, and $48 per user per year, respectively.<\/p>\n

Aside from using strong passwords, the smartest thing you can do to keep your online accounts safe is to use two-factor authentication<\/a> everywhere it’s offered. Two-factor authentication requires you to have a second form of identifying information \u2014 like a code generated by an app on your phone \u2014 in addition to your primary password, thus making it substantially more difficult for a modern-day ruffian to get into your account.<\/p>\n

The best app for managing two-factor authentication on Android is Authy. The Twilio-owned program outshines Google’s own Authenticator offering with a modern, intuitive design that makes it a cinch to find and copy codes for any number of 2FA-enabled accounts. It has handy advanced features like support for app-level fingerprint protection, too, and you can even set Authy up to function on multiple devices \u2014 including, if you’re so inclined, your desktop computer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Authy is free.<\/p>\n

Virtual private networks, or VPNs, can be an effective way of keeping your phone-based data transmissions private and secure \u2014 particularly when you’re using public Wi-Fi networks, which are notorious for letting outsiders “snoop” and see all sorts of sensitive info<\/a> from your sessions.<\/p>\n

Your best bet for work is to use your company’s own VPN service, assuming an app for it is available. If not, NordVPN is one of the most widely recommended third-party options, earning strong praise from privacy guru (and frequent Computerworld contributor) Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols<\/a> and landing within the top Android VPN picks of Android Central<\/a>, PCMag<\/a>, TechRadar<\/a>, Tom’s Guide<\/a>, and numerous other prominent outlets.<\/p>\n

The service taps into 3,000 servers across five dozen countries and promises “military-grade” encryption for all your mobile traffic. It’ll set you back 12 bucks a month<\/a>, $6 a month if you pay for a year in advance, or just over $3 a month if you’re willing to pay a lump sum of $79 up front for two years of service.<\/p>\n

NordVPN allows you to create secure connections from a variety of servers around the world.<\/p>\n

Now, all of this isn’t to say that other Android VPN providers won’t be effective. Evaluating a VPN app is incredibly complex and difficult to do definitively \u2014 and the number of variables involved makes it virtually impossible to offer an unconditional recommendation. (The good folks at Ars Technica sum up the challenge<\/a> well.) Heck, one look at this comparison chart<\/a> by That One Privacy Site \u2014 a highly regarded independent VPN reviewer cited by the Electronic Frontier Foundation<\/a>, among other noteworthy organizations \u2014 is enough to make you want to crawl into a bunker and live a life free from all networked technology.<\/p>\n

Until we have a standardized system for effectively auditing VPNs and their many layers, most privacy experts suggest going with a well-reviewed and widely evaluated service from a reputable provider. NordVPN fits that description to a T \u2014 more so than any other contender at the moment \u2014 hence its inclusion in this collection.<\/p>\n

When you need to know your emails won’t be intercepted, ProtonMail is the app you want to use. Founded by scientists at CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), ProtonMail uses an open-source method of end-to-end encryption to keep your messages safe from prying eyes. You don’t have to provide any personal information, and the company says it keeps no records of IP addresses or anything else that could link you to your account. In fact, the company says even its own employees couldn’t read or access your messages if they wanted to.<\/p>\n

(You might have heard of ProtonMail on the TV show Mr. Robot<\/em>, by the way \u2014 where master hacker Elliot Alderson uses the app<\/a> to secure transmissions \u2014 as well as in the news by way of Cambridge Analytica, the “data analytics” firm at the center of the Facebook data debacle, which apparently used ProtonMail<\/a> to create secure and self-destructing messages.)<\/p>\n

The best part about all of ProtonMail’s security is that it requires next to no effort on your behalf: You simply create an account with the service and then email away. If you’re emailing someone else with a ProtonMail address, encryption is automatic. If you need to contact someone with a non-ProtonMail address, you can tap an icon in the app’s compose tool to create a password and a hint; the recipient will then be sent only that information and will have to use the password to decrypt your message.<\/p>\n

ProtonMail’s encryption is both effective and easy to use \u2014 even with recipients who aren’t using ProtonMail themselves.<\/p>\n

Security aside, ProtonMail’s Android app is cleanly designed and pleasant to use. The app has customizable labels and folders and even allows you to define custom swipe gestures for your inbox (swiping left on a message to mark it as read, for instance, and swiping right to archive or delete). And, yes, it has an option for creating self-destructing messages, should the need ever arise.<\/p>\n

ProtonMail is free at its most basic level, which includes one address, 500MB of storage, and up to 150 messages a day. You can get more storage, more messages per day, and additional features \u2014 including email filters, an auto-responder system, and support for custom domains \u2014 starting at $59 a year<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Signal does for texting what ProtonMail does for email: The open-source service allows you to communicate securely with contacts, using end-to-end encryption and without any of your data ever being accessed or stored on a remote server. The app also now allows you to conduct encrypted voice and video calls with other Signal users.<\/p>\n

On the surface, Signal looks and feels just like any other texting app: You can find people from your regular contacts database or simply enter a phone number to start a conversation. If the other person also uses Signal, the conversation will be secure \u2014 and you’ll see the option to launch a secure voice or video chat as well. If your recipient isn’t using Signal, you’ll still be able to text normally and will see a prominent “Unsecured SMS” warning in the message field.<\/p>\n

Signal feels like any other texting app, but when you communicate with another Signal user, all of your transmissions are automatically encrypted.<\/p>\n

Signal is free, and no accounts are required; you just open the app, input and then verify your phone number, and you’re ready to roll.<\/p>\n

Firefox Focus provides the simplest and most effortless private browsing experience on Android. Quite literally, all you do is open the app and go: No history, cookies, or passwords are ever saved, and the app automatically blocks trackers and ads across the web. When you’re done with a page, you tap a floating trash can icon in the corner of the screen, and poof: It’s gone forever, with no trail left behind.<\/p>\n

Firefox Focus makes privacy-first browsing as simple as can be.<\/p>\n

Firefox Focus has a handful of settings for controlling the nuances of its blocking features, but there’s really not much more to it. If you want to browse the web without leaving a trace (at least, as far as the browser itself is concerned), this is by far the easiest way to do it.<\/p>\n

Firefox Focus is free.<\/p>\n

For private browsing power in a more traditional browser environment, Brave Browser is the way to go. The free app \u2014 created by a co-founder of Mozilla<\/a>, the company behind Firefox \u2014 looks and acts an awful lot like Google’s Chrome Android browser. (Perhaps not surprisingly, the program uses Google’s open source Chromium code as its base.)<\/p>\n

Brave’s main interface and menus are almost undistinguishable from Chrome’s, in fact, and the app even has Chrome-reminiscent History, Downloads, and Bookmarks sections along with features for auto-filling information and saving passwords (though the data from those areas won’t sync with your Google account or be available on other devices, as it would in Chrome).<\/p>\n

On top of that foundation, however, Brave includes a variety of built-in tools for blocking ads, pop-ups, scripts, and different types of website-based tracking systems. Unlike Firefox Focus, it doesn’t operate in a permanent incognito mode \u2014 so if you want to avoid having your history, cookies, site data, and cache saved, you’ll have to either manually open incognito windows (just like you would in Chrome) or dig through the app’s settings to clear that data whenever needed.<\/p>\n

Brave is basically like Chrome \u2014 only with a bunch of extra privacy-oriented options added in.<\/p>\n

It’s less of a no-frills, purely private browser and more of a standard browser with additional privacy features baked in \u2014 which could be an asset or a liability, depending on your preferences.<\/p>\n

Most current Android phones come with encryption enabled out of the box (you can check by looking for the “Encryption” option within the Security section of your device’s system settings) \u2014 but if you want an extra layer of protection for certain files or folders, Solid Explorer will get the job done.<\/p>\n

As an Android file manager<\/a>, Solid Explorer lets you browse and manipulate the files on your device’s local storage as well as on a variety of third-party cloud storage services \u2014 including Dropbox, Google Drive, and Microsoft OneDrive \u2014 if you choose to connect them. When you have a file or folder you want to protect, you just find and highlight it within the app and then select “Encrypt” from the main menu.<\/p>\n

After that, all you have to do is type in a password and optionally activate fingerprint authentication, and the file will then be viewable only after your credentials have been entered. Even system-level services like the Android Downloads app won’t be able to open the file unless you first decrypt it in Solid Explorer.<\/p>\n

Solid Explorer lets you add an extra layer of encryption to specific files and folders.<\/p>\n

Solid Explorer costs $2 after a free two-week trial.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/www.computerworld.com\/category\/security\/index.rss<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Credit to Author: JR Raphael| Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2018 03:00:00 -0700<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
\n

Let’s get one thing out of the way right off the bat: If you’re looking for recommendations about Android security suites or other malware-scanning software, you’ve come to the wrong place.<\/p>\n

Why? Because, like most people who closely study Android, I don’t recommend<\/a> using those types of apps at all. Android malware isn’t the massive real-world threat it’s frequently made out to be, and Google Play Protect<\/a> and other native Android features<\/a> are more than enough<\/a> to keep most devices safe.<\/p>\n

To read this article in full, please click here<\/a><\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[11062,10643],"tags":[10462,10554,10463,5897,714],"class_list":["post-12106","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computerworld","category-independent","tag-android","tag-mobile","tag-mobile-security","tag-privacy","tag-security"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12106","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12106"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12106\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12106"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12106"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.palada.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12106"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}