• by Admin

Your Smartphone as a Digital Vault: Kaspersky Insights

Kaspersky's latest research reveals a rather surprising fact about how Indonesians manage their personal data. As many as 57 percent of respondents are found to routinely store sensitive personal documents — such as national ID cards, passports, and insurance documents — directly on their smartphones.

A Shift in Smartphone Function Not Yet Matched by Security Awareness

According to Anton Kivva, a cybersecurity expert at Kaspersky, smartphones now function much like personal assistants, touching nearly every aspect of their users' lives. The data entrusted to these devices goes far beyond simple photos or text messages. Regionally, Kaspersky's Asia Pacific survey found that 65 percent of respondents store personal photos and videos, 57 percent store contacts, 50 percent store message history, and nearly half store work emails on their phones.

Unfortunately, this shift in function has not been fully matched by adequate security awareness. Adrian Hia, Managing Director of Kaspersky Asia Pacific, stressed that the impact of losing a device or falling victim to a cyberattack is now far more severe, since what's at stake is no longer just communication data but an individual's entire digital life.

Implications for Corporate Security Policy

For companies with Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policies, these findings carry broader relevance. Employees' personal devices are often also used to access work email, internal applications, and company documents. As a result, careless data storage habits on personal devices can become a security gap just as significant as threats originating from company servers or networks — an aspect that internal IT teams often overlook.

Data Protection Recommendations

Kaspersky recommends several basic steps to reduce this risk, including using an encrypted digital vault instead of a standard photo gallery for sensitive documents, using password manager applications equipped with a secret vault feature, and ensuring devices are protected by security solutions capable of detecting threats early.

Perkom can help companies develop more comprehensive mobile security policies — not only from a technology standpoint, but also through employee education on safer data storage practices. For organizations that don't yet have such a policy in place, now is an opportune moment to start addressing it seriously.

Author: Ghea Devita

Marketing Communication PT Perkom Indah Murni