A shocking report (Opens in a new window) found that almost half of Android-based smartphones used by US state and local government personnel were running out-of-date operating systems.

Lookout, a cybersecurity company, conducted an analysis of 200 million devices and 175 million applications between 2021 and the second half of 2022, and discovered alarming figures that indicate millions of government gadgets are vulnerable to assaults.

Ten months after its introduction, according to Lookout, 30% of federal government devices and close to 50% of state and local government devices still lacked the Android upgrade.

In actuality, Android 8 and 9 were still being used by 10.7% of federal government devices and another 17.7% of state and local government devices in March 2022 and November 2021, respectively.

Compared to Android 12, which had 423 vulnerabilities, Android 8 had 1,332, according to Lookout. Older operating systems are vulnerable since they are no longer supported by Google or Apple, and as time goes on, the number of vulnerabilities will only grow.

However, only Android users have a patchy acceptance of new operating system updates in the government sector. The study shows that 30% of state and local government devices and 5% of federal government devices still using outdated operating systems ten months after the release of iOS 15.

Prior to the midterm elections, the FBI warned (Opens in a new window) cyber attackers will probably “continue or escalate their targeting on US election officials” through phishing efforts.

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In 2020, the federal administration discovered suffered a major cyberattack (Opens in a new window) after months of going unnoticed. According to The Guardian, it is believed that Russian agents were behind the highly technical operation that resulted in more than 18,000 private and government users downloading an infected software update. Because of the attack, hackers from different government departments were able to view internal emails.

The British government is under pressure to look into claims that former PM Liz Truss used her phone was hacked (Opens in a new window) when serving as Foreign Secretary earlier this year.

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