In keeping with one of my New Year's Resolutions to improve the security of my customers (including iOS Apple devices) so they can take advantage of the benefits of modern technology, I want to address mobile device security this month.

The explosion of Smartphones and tablets has created a large attack arena with mountains of personal and business data for hackers to mine.

As the market share of these devices has increased, so has the interest of hackers in breaking into them, and it's easy to see why. 

Figures vary -- one estimate puts the number of mobile devices world-wide at 4.5 billion. A counter at gsmaintelligence.com that counts the number of mobile devices based on real-time data from mobile operators world-wide puts the figure at 7.3 billion and counting -- or more mobile gadgets than people in the world.

The two leaders in mobile operating systems -- Apple's iOS and Google's Android -- dwarf all other mobile devices in market share. According to netmarketshare.com, Android leads with 45.86% market share and Apple is just behind at 43.15%.

Those numbers have attracted the attention of hackers. In fact, the number of unique mobile device malware apps more than doubled in 2014, from 2 million at the start of the year to 4.37 million by year's end, according to the antivirus firm Trend Micro. The rate of malware apps accelerated during the year, with a 68 percent increase from June 30 to Dec. 31.

Add that the average person remains unaware that their mobile devices are actually computers storing and accessing information, that they can be infected just like their computers, that mobile devices are littered with questionable apps with their own vulnerabilities, that mobile devices are  easily lost or stolen, that those devices often access public networks with little or no security, and that employees increasingly use their business devices for personal use, and 2015 could see a marked increase in attacks on mobile devices.  

The obvious question, then, is how do you protect your mobile device from these threats, either as an employee, business owner or home user?

For home users, virtually all of the major anti-virus companies now offer security products for mobile devices.

For businesses, we're currently running a trial on a cloud-based security solution for Windows computers and servers and Android and Apple mobile devices that, if all goes well, we'll be able to offer in the February-March timeframe.

This solution implements policy-based security measures that follow the device no matter where it is, and provides anti-virus, anti-malware, intrusion protection and web site filtering with the ability to tailor the policies to fit your organization's needs.

If attackers still make their way in or you lose a device or it's stolen, this cloud solution allows the device to be locked or wiped remotely to try to stop the hacker from stealing yours or your company's information.

In short, this solution secures the USER, which goes hand in hand with what I preach about security -- it's the USER who needs to be secured and educated about security issues.

And that brings me to my final point -- because hackers so often bypass security measures with social engineering tricks designed to induce users to unwittingly give up information like user names and passwords, you must be vigilant -- vigilance that should now extend to mobile devices.