Appdome Tackles Geo-Fraud with More Defenses for Mobile Apps

India, July 24, 2024 – Appdome, the mobile app economy’s one-stop shop for mobile defense, today announced it has enhanced its award-winning Geo-Fraud Detection service to include two new defenses: Geo-Location Fencing and Geo DeSync Attack Detection. Combined with other Geo-Compliance features available on the Appdome platform, mobile app developers and enterprises can eliminate location-based fraud, ensure geo-compliance and deliver location relevant user experiences in mobile apps free from location spoofing, fake location, VPNs, Fake GPS Apps and other threats.

Geo-fencing is essential in finance apps and other regulated industries that need to meet Know Your Customer (KYC) and other compliance mandates, such as the US Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC), EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), and the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) requirements. Geo-fencing enables mobile app developers to restrict or limit app access on a country or regional level, ensuring that operations are compliant with local laws and regulations.

A Geo Desync Attack is a cyber-attack that intentionally creates mismatches in location data on a mobile device. By manipulating GPS coordinates, altering the time zone settings, and falsifying accelerometer readings, attackers can deceive location-based services and security systems. This type of attack can lead to inaccurate tracking, unauthorized access, and potential breaches of security protocols, undermining the integrity of location-dependent applications and services.

“Detecting geo related fraud is a top priority in today’s mobile app economy. Attackers are increasingly using location spoofing to avoid compliance, for example,” said Eric Newcomer, CTO and Principal Analyst at Intellyx. “Mobile apps rely on accurate location for their services and are increasingly required to confirm device location to maintain trust. Appdome’s mobile Geo Compliance service reduces developer complexity for implementing advanced geo-compliance security features.”

Unlike legacy geo compliance offerings that rely on proprietary, costly, and vendor-built geo service networks, the Appdome Geo Compliance solution zeros in on protecting the mobile device’s built-in location services and ensures these services have not been abused or tampered with. Appdome’s approach eliminates the need for third-party networks, SDKs, complex server-based implementations and does not require third-party monthly usage fees, allowing the enforcement to work even if the device is not network-connected.

“Offering a broad range of mobile Geo Compliance features under a single pane of glass with other security and anti-fraud defenses is a game changer,” said Tom Tovar, co-creator and CEO of Appdome. “These added Geo-Fraud defenses showcase how the Appdome platform is uniquely extensible, and allows brands, developers and enterprises alike to solve multiple mobile app defense objectives simultaneously in the same automated workflow.”

The full Appdome Mobile Geo-Compliance solution puts an end to geo-fraud by detecting fake location, fake GPS apps, fraudulent location, detect VPN, no SIM (fake device), teleportation, Geo DeSync and other attacks. Customers simply select the Geo-Compliance features needed in any Android & iOS apps and initiate the build command from CI/CD or using the Appdome Platform’s “Build My App” button. Appdome’s patented technology uses machine learning to code the defenses into each application, so mobile developers don’t have to.

“Compliance was the early driver for our geo-fraud solution, but now there’s so much more customers are getting out of it,” said Chris Roeckl, Chief Product Officer of Appdome. “Stopping location-fraud and ensuring valid, real location in mobile applications is universal across every Android & iOS app, whether it’s a streaming, dating, restaurant, retail, gig economy or other app. True location is what we deliver in these mobile apps.”

The Appdome Geo-Compliance solution is available in multiple enforcement modes including advanced telemetry and customized responses or workflows when geo compliance threats are detected, and monitoring geo-fraud attacks via the Appdome ThreatScope™ Mobile XDR, either before or after the deployment of geo-location defenses via the Appdome platform.