Companies scramble to fix lack of encryption on mobile apps

Several companies have moved quickly to add encryption to their mobile apps after it was discovered they failied to encrypt payment card information in transit, putting users at risk.

The apps were not using SSL/TLS (Secure Sockets Layer/Transport Layer Security), an encryption protocol that scrambles data as it's sent across the Internet, according to Wandera, a cloud and mobile security vendor.

"With so many breaches and costly data loss incidents in the news, it's hard to believe that any business would fail to take such a basic precaution as to encrypt sensitive traffic as it's transmitted to or from a website," said Michael J. Covington, senior product manager, in a video posted Wednesday.

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