[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]When Android first made its way into the consumer market, no one could have predicted the impact it would have. Android was an operating system developed with a simple idea at its core: Google’s founders wanted smarter mobile devices that better served their users.
Today, that simple idea has helped make Android the most popular mobile OS on the market, with a global share of 66% and rapidly rising.
Android’s popularity can largely be traced to its sheer diversity. Almost from the beginning, it has been an open platform, and there are countless devices from countless manufacturers that users can choose between.
Therein lies the problem – due to its widespread popularity, Android finds itself targeted by criminals and malware with greater frequency than any other operating system. This means that although the OS is not inherently vulnerable, any vulnerabilities that do exist tend to be exploited if they aren’t patched in a timely fashion. Moreover, because so many different vendors count themselves as players in the Android space, it’s inevitable that some will lag behind with security patching.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]In the meantime, their devices will remain vulnerable, even as they’re being used to handle sensitive business data.
“Nearly every organization supporting smartphones and tablets must have a strategy to support Android devices, despite some of the security challenges,” reads a recent white paper by J. Gold Associates.
“As we moved to a more mobile world over the past several years, the number of potential attack points increased dramatically, and many of them consisted of user-selected and often unsecured devices as a byproduct of BYOD,” the paper continues.
“The ability to secure data and prevent corporate breaches consistently ranks among the top issues both IT and general management struggle with on a regular basis. A February 2016 Ponemon Institute survey shows that 67% of companies are either certain or very likely to have had a security breach due to a mobile device.”
Slow security patching is far from the only threat facing Android within the enterprise. To grant themselves additional freedoms and run certain applications, many users choose to root their devices, stripping away core security functionality in the interest of personalization. And though measures such as Samsung KNOX and Android for Work exist to separate corporate and private data, these software solutions can be fooled by a savvy enough user.
What is Rooting?
“Rooting” refers to the process by which a mobile user alters or replaces system applications
or settings which are ordinarily inaccessible to them, sometimes even replacing the operating
system entirely.
That’s where BlackBerry comes in. Security has always been in BlackBerry’s blood, and the company has always made it a priority to protect both clients and their data. That’s why the company made their own foray into the Android device market, bringing their full security expertise to bear.
BlackBerry has long set the bar for mobile security, and their approach to Android is no different.
Analyst’s View “The lack of quickly implementing updates to the latest version of the OS is often a key factor in enabling known exploits…Some manufacturers can take 60-180 days to upgrade to a new OS version after Google has made it available…This is a major security issue.”
Other mobile device vendors can take weeks or months to release patches. Along with Google’s
Nexus devices, BlackBerry has a record of being the quickest device manufacturer on the market to deliver security updates.
When Google releases its security bulletin each month, BlackBerry sends out a Security Maintenance Release to address any flagged vulnerabilities. The company also provide
as-needed hotfixes for critical vulnerabilities outside those maintenance windows, such as their recent fixes for the Quadrooter vulnerability.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
Dedicated Security Response Teams
Providing world-class security has always been a significant area of focus for BlackBerry, which is why they have several teams dedicated to security:
The BlackBerry Security Incident Response Team (BBSIRT) ensures that public and private reports of vulnerabilities are quickly received, analysed, and mitigated to protect their clients. This team collaborates with customers, partners, vendors, governments, academics, and security researchers to monitor and address the Android threat landscape 365 days a year.
The Security Research Group is a global team of ethical hackers whose mandate is to identify security issues in the BlackBerry product portfolio and work closely with development teams to resolve them. They also conduct active research into advanced security threats and defensive technologies.
Security works best if it meshes with what the employees want – it’s most effective when it’s not inconvenient to connect to a security solution or use a device. BlackBerry currently offers three highly attractive options for business users who want to experience Android through BlackBerry; the PRIV, released in 2015, and the DTEK50 and DTEK60, all-touch devices.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
DTEK50 / DTEK60
DTEK50 and DTEK60 combine everything you’ve come to expect from BlackBerry with all the apps and great experiences of Android. They feature great cameras and brilliant screens, plus the best integrated messaging experience on a smartphone. Added security lets you know when you could be at risk from hackers, so you can easily take action to protect the private details of your life.
Available at affordable, business-friendly price points, DTEK50 and DTEK60 offer stellar hardware specs, excellent battery life, and a host of productivity-oriented tools like the BlackBerry Convenience Key. Located on the right side of the phone, a single press of this key gives the user quick access to their most-used application or task. Other productivity-enabling features include:
- Gesture Controls allow for greater ease of navigation, and can be customized based
on user preferences. - Device Search and Instant Actions allow a user to execute commands through the search bar, without having to seek out or open an application.
- The BlackBerry Hub, now available as a standalone subscription service on Android, consolidates all of a user’s communications into a single place, where they can then be easily organized. This includes phone calls, email, social media notifications, scheduling alerts, and text messages.
- BlackBerry’s Intelligent Keyboard learns how a user types, providing word suggestions that increase typing speed and accuracy in up to three languages of their choice.
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Device Security Built in from The Start
Improving the integrity of the Android OS is a cornerstone of BlackBerry’s approach to securing Android. To that end, the company has incorporated many improvements to Android’s core security, locking down device capabilities that could give attackers the opportunity to compromise a device – and in so doing, your organization. From the Hardware Root of Trust to their own enhanced bootloader, everything about PRIV, DTEK50 and DTEK60 is architected to protect your data, both corporate and personal.
The Hardware Root of Trust
Rather than layering on defenses after production, BlackBerry has built security into PRIV, DTEK50 and DTEK60 from the start. The manufacturing process makes use of the Hardware Root of Trust, a proprietary technique that adds security keys to the device processor as it’s built. These keys are then used to track, verify, and provision each device, ensuring their authenticity and integrity are guaranteed – along with the safety of the data they contain.
In addition to serving as the foundation of the company’s other security measures, the Hardware Root of Trust acts as a safeguard against counterfeiting, which could expose your organization to a wide range of malware.
BlackBerry’s Secure Bootloader
Built upon the Hardware Root of Trust, the secure boot chain in BlackBerry’s Android makes use of multiple verification stages to ensure that the device has not been tampered with. Each stage of the secure boot chain must verify that the next component is intact before proceeding. This further protects DTEK50, DTEK60 and PRIV against tampering and ensures that rooted devices – and the security risks they represent – are not present in your organization.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
BlackBerry Integrity Detection
BlackBerry Integrity Detection continuously monitors for events or configuration changes that may indicate a device’s security is compromised. It integrates readily with EMM and third-party monitoring solutions, so that when a suspicious modification is detected it’s easy to generate integrity reports and automated responses to compromised devices.
Android OS Hardening
BlackBerry has strengthened Google’s own Android security enhancements (Android for Work, user profile controls, etc.) with several of their own. For example, improved Address Space Layout randomization scrambles the operating system’s code to make it harder for attackers to locate vulnerabilities. BlackBerry has also hardened the Android kernel, removing unnecessary functionality which would otherwise render the operating system vulnerable.
FIPS 140-2 Compliant Full Disk Encryption
BlackBerry Powered Android devices protect their data with full-disk encryption, which is turned on automatically and cannot be disabled. BlackBerry further enhances the protections provided by this encryption through the use of a FIPS 140-2 compliant kernel. This is the same sort of encryption employed by the United States government, and allows the company’s devices to be readily used in regulated industries; encryption keys are cordoned off within BlackBerry Secure Compound and fully write-protected. This means that even if a device is lost or stolen, your information is safe.
Security often seems complicated, obtuse, and troublesome for both the administrator and the end user – but it doesn’t need to be. BlackBerry’s Android is designed to give the end user visibility and control of their data, while BlackBerry make your corporate devices more secure by making security both painless and convenient.
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Other Security Features
BlackBerry’s Android offers a number of other diverse security options, including:
- Media Card Protection: PRIV, DTEK50 and DTEK60 control who can access a device’s media card, protecting the information stored there and further separating work and personal profiles.
- Remote Device Management: Lost or stolen devices can be located through GPS positioning, and they can also be remotely locked and wiped.
- Application Sandboxing: On BlackBerry Powered by Android, applications are isolated to their own area of the device, and sandboxed off from one another to minimize the damage that might be caused by a rogue app.
- Data-in-transit protection: Information traveling over Wi-Fi, VPN, Bluetooth, and NFC connections is fully encrypted.
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