As many as 97 per cent of the top 100 paid Android apps and 87 per cent of the top 100 Apple iOS apps have been hacked, according to research.
Technology specialist Arxan’s annual report into the state of mobile app security updates previous years’ indicators on the prevalence of hacked apps on the two major platforms, iOS and Android.
The high proportion of hacked Android apps is in line with results from prior years. However, the iOS percentage represents a sharp increase over 2013, when 56 per cent of iOS apps were hacked.
Increased app hacking is important because of the rapid growth in global mobile app usage across all vertical sectors, and the report reveals evidence of widespread hacking of financial, healthcare and retail software.
As much as 95 per cent of Android financial apps reviewed were cracked, while 70 per cent of the iOS financial apps were hacked.
"The pursuit of greater mobile application security remains at the forefront of our research and development initiatives," said Jonathan Carter, technical director at Arxan.
The report highlights the growing need for mobile applications to contain self-protections, which add security features into the application runtime environment.
Arxan’s report findings are based on an analysis of 360 apps, including the 100 top paid apps, and the same 20 popular free apps from each platform.
