According to a recent survey conducted by Datamonitor on behalf of McAfee, 86 percent of mobile device users are concerned to some extent or other about security risks.
Datamonitor polled 2000 users in the United States, Britain, and Japan, and found that people's biggest concern centers around the loss of important data and worries about receiving inappropriate or unsolicited content was their next biggest concern. Worries about fraud followed closely as the third biggest concern.
Interestingly enough, 79% of the people surveyed don't use any kind of protective software to help guard their mobile devices. Furthrmore, at least half of the respondents probably have no plans to install such software themselves. According to the survey, "59% expect mobile operators to take primary responsibility for protecting mobile devices and services."
McAfee sees the results as motivation for mobile service carriers to install McAfee security software onto the devices that they sell to their customers.
"Concerns about specific mobile security risks or the loss of credibility in the reliability of services is a crucial issue for operators, particularly in mature markets. Yet, this research clearly highlights that consumer fears are growing in tandem with increased mobile functionality, jeopardizing the success of new revenue-generating services and \[jeopardizing the average revenue collected per user\]," said Victor Kouznetsov, senior vice president of McAfee Mobile Security.
