The predictions are not comforting. They include death by Internet-connected devices and the use of emerging near field communications (NFC) in smart phones for large-scale fraud and theft.
Making predictions a year or more out is not that difficult when it involves emerging technologies, Ferguson said. The timeline for adoption of new mobile functionality such as NFC on smart phones falls into the 12-to-18 month range. Though many of the applications or similar apps — the technology also is expected to be used in physical authentication, such as access systems to government or other public-sector buildings. As NFC catches on, it could also be used in some government transactions.
The first phones using NFC already have appeared, such as the Samsung Galaxy S III, which can be used as a hardware security token much like a contactless card and can share data with other similarly equipped phones. The technology is expected to take off , with Juniper Research predicting that nearly one in five smart phones will have it worldwide, and this will spur development of e-commerce applications.
It is not the NFC protocols themselves that pose the risk, Ferguson said. “It’s all of the apps that interface with that technology.” Almost all e-commerce and banking applications have vulnerabilities in their first year, he said. He warned that as the use of NFC for transactions reaches critical mass, cybercriminals will turn their attention to these applications to gain access to accounts, and the first generation of apps are likely to provide low-hanging fruit for them.