An analysis of the transactions that come from Zscaler's security-protected devices reveals that iOS apps leak users' personal information more often than Android applications.
The result of this study shows that the generally accepted theory that iOS wants to be safer than Android does not necessarily apply to applications running on these two platforms.
According to the data collected in the last quarter, the Zscaler reports that he detected about 200.000 transactions from a set of 45 million, where an application leaked user data.
The type of information leaked includes personally identifiable information (PII) ie its number mobile and e-mail addresses, geolocation data (longitude and latitude coordinates), and device metadata (IMEI, MAC, IMSI numbers, Network, OS, SIM card details, and manufacturer).
The highest rate of leaks was observed from iOS applications. Zscaler reports that it tracked 26 million transactions from iOS devices and their applications, of which 0,5 percent leaked user data, for a total of 130.000 businesses.
The vast majority of leaked data, 72,3 per cent, was related to information about the user's device. In addition, 27,5% of transactions were leaked by geo-location coordinates, while only 0,2% of the applications leaked PII or personally identifiable information data.
70 percent of all transactions leaked privacy of users were from iOS devices in China, and 20 percent on devices in South Africa. The USA, Great Britain and the Republic of Ireland occupy the next positions in the top 5.
With regard to Android apps, Zscaler reports that 20 watched millions of transactions and leaked them from 0.3% user data, or about 60.000 transactions.
Of these, 58% was device metadata, 39,3% geo-location information, and 3% leaked sensitive PII or personally identifiable information.
Most of the leaks occurred from Android devices in the US (55%), United Kingdom (16%) and China (12%).