15.01.2024 Views

CompTIA A+ Certification All-in-One Exam Guide

  • No tags were found...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

YUMPU automatically turns print PDFs into web optimized ePapers that Google loves.

authentication methods. Access to a corporate VPN, for example, may

require a specific app, approved and published by the organization,

configured with the correct security settings. Generic apps have the ability to

use multiple sets of credentials to access different Web sites, networks, or

network-based services (for example, corporate e-mail, VPN access, and so

forth). There are also apps that can act as tokens or issue temporary session

PINs for multifactor authentication. The key to these apps is configuration;

settings vary per app, but might include network configuration, authentication

or encryption settings, and properly registering a given service with the

authenticator app.

Trusted Sources Versus Untrusted Sources

For the most part, getting software from trusted sources—legitimate app

stores run by the major vendors, such as Apple, Google, Microsoft, and

Amazon—is both easy and secure. Different vendors have their own

requirements (including security) that developers must meet in order to get an

app into the vendor’s store. Most differences stem from the development and

support model used by the vendor.

Apple strictly controls all aspects of the device and the apps available in

the App Store (though organizations have some freedom to distribute apps

developed in-house to their own devices). For example, Apple has exact

requirements for how developers must create an app sold via the App Store.

Android, on the other hand, has much less central control. One way

Android’s relaxed controls manifest is the ability to install apps from

untrusted sources.

The operating system flavors developed by different Android device

makers can change which sources are and aren’t trusted. What may run on

devices sold by one vendor isn’t necessarily guaranteed to run on another

vendor’s device, even though they all use variations of the Android operating

system. A prime example is Amazon’s line of Fire devices (including

products like Fire TV, Fire Tablet, and Kindle Fire), which can only get apps

from the Amazon Appstore. Additionally, even apps from the Google Play

store aren’t subject to guidelines as strict as the ones Apple uses. That doesn’t

mean they are necessarily less secure, but it does make security issues more

likely.

The security weakness third-party app stores create is essentially apps

Hooray! Your file is uploaded and ready to be published.

Saved successfully!

Ooh no, something went wrong!