Lookout Mobile App Introduces Breach Alerts And Identity Protection To Help Keep Personal Data Safe From Theft

Lookout, a San Francisco-based mobile security company, has announced two new features, including breach alerts and identity protection to help keep individuals personal data safe from digital and physical theft.

“Having been focused on mobile for nearly a decade, we know mobile threats are on the rise.” Sachin Kansal, vice president of consumer products at Lookout, said as to why he was inspired to launch breach reports and identity protection.

In 2015 alone, there were 781 data breaches tracked in the U.S., according to a report released by the Identity Theft Resource Center. By October of this year, the number of breaches in 2016 have surpassed the data breaches in 2015.

“The trends we’ve seen over the past two years - with the increased frequency of sophisticated corporate data breaches and the rising concern and helplessness from consumers about identity theft - have us worried.” Kansal told IBTimes, “So, it's more important than ever that people keep not only their mobile devices safe, but protect all their digital information across the web. We want to make sure individuals are alerted as quickly as possible about device threats and risks to their personal and private online information so they can take immediate action to keep their identity safe. Breach Report and Identity Protection was the natural extension to our robust security app.”

The Yahoo! breach, which was the largest in history with more than 500M credentials leaked, is a good example of how Lookout’s new features can help protect users and their personal information.

“ If this happened today, Breach Report would alert users of Yahoo! services about the breach and provide them with straightforward advice about the precautionary measures that they can take to protect their personal information,” Kansal said. “Lookout’s Identity Protection takes the protection to the next level by notifying users if their personal information - like email address, credit card number, or Social Security number - has been found exposed online due to a certain breach and then gives them access to our 24/7 ID Restoration Experts who will help remediate and resolve the situation.”

When asked how many users are expected to pay for Lookout Premium/Lookout Premium Plus, Kansal told IBTimes, “We expect that a subset of our existing tens of millions of users will be interested in these premium features today, and that interest will continue to grow over time as awareness of mobile threats continues to rise.”

For Lookout Premium offering, the company is already offering a free trial of the features. “Through user testing, we saw that people were hesitant to share personal information during a time-capped, short-lived trial phase of Lookout Premium Plus. Consumers want to be confident about their desire to commit to the service before they share their information,” Kansal said. “Therefore, we removed the trial phase for Premium Plus.”

Lookout Premium Plus offers features available in Lookout Premium, plus:

Cyber Watch: Monitors personal and financial information and sends alerts they they are being used fraudulently online. Lookout monitors email, phone number, bank accounts, credit card, social media, etc.

Lost Wallet Recovery: If you’re wallet happens to get stolen, ID Restoration Experts will work with you to contact document issuers to cancel and reorder credit cards and identification cards.

Lookout Premium is now available on Android and iOS for $2.99 per month. Lookout Premium Plus is available in the U.S. on iOS for $9.99 per month, and will be soon rolling out to select U.S. Android users.

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