67% of UK workers pose a cybersecurity risk due to phone use

Today, almost everyone is constantly on their phone. We use it for socialising, banking, booking, gaming, paying, travelling, ordering and of course, for work. 

Phones are phenomenal in their ability to keep us connected, something we have all relied on in both a professional and personal sense over the pandemic. But, with the rise of working from home more needs to be done by business leaders to ensure safe and secure phone practice. 

According to a recent study by telecommunications provider  TextAnywhere, 67.4% of UK employees use their mobiles for work, presenting a major security risk for businesses. Cybercriminals can use easy gateways, like unsecured WiFi or third-party applications to access sensitive information on your employee's phone, via chat messages, business emails or collaboration apps. 

They can also launch phishing attacks against your employee's number or email, to compromise their phone to access sensitive info or bypass two-factor authentication to access their other devices and accounts.  

This is a security risk that can’t be taken lightly, considering that 88% of UK companies according to Carbon Black faced a breach in the last twelve months. 

So, what can business leaders do? 

They need to concentrate their efforts surrounding phones in two specific areas, company policy and employee training. 

Businesses not only need robust remote access policies, procedures and best practices surrounding phones, but they also need to ensure employees are aware of and following these policies. 

This is where employee training comes in. Employees need to be educated on safe practices when accessing platforms via mobile, and how to enhance their phone’s general security.

Regular cybersecurity training is vital in helping your team better understand how they can protect the organisation from threats and what they can do to be more alert. Keeping organisations safe is something that everyone has a role to play in, no longer just IT or Security. 

Working from home has both improved our work-life balance and led to an increasing blurring of the lines between work and home when it comes to our devices. To reduce the risk of your employee's phones being compromised, you must invest in policies and training that will allow your employees to remain as productive and secure on their phones as possible. 

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