Mobile security threats to create $3.6 billion software opportunity: Juniper

Sprint has announced that it's offering a Lookout Mobile Security application through the Android Market (click on the Sprint Tab or Sprint Zone) offering subscribers a way to protect the data on their devices from "theft, loss, mobile malware, phishing attempts and malicious websites."

The offerings — there are free and not-free but available for free-trial options — dovetail nicely with a Juniper Research report also debuting today, regarding the opportunity that skyrocketing smartphone and tablet sales are opening up for mobile security software providers. By 2016, the report states, the combination of widespread device ownership and bad people with mean coding skills will result in a $3.6 billion opportunity.

"We believe that the market for mobile security products will go mainstream by late 2013 as the vulnerability of data centric mobile devices becomes more widely appreciated both in the business and consumer sectors," Juniper analyst Nitin Bhas said in a statement. "High-profile security alerts are likely to heighten the public's awareness of this growing issue."

Juniper additionally expects 277 million mobile devices to run some kind of protection by 2016, and for the number of tablets with a security product on board to exceed the number of similarly protected smartphones. (Which makes sense, since it's easier to extend a PC-security mentality to the former than the latter, yes?) Also expected: enterprise security for tablets, smartphones and even feature phones will represent the majority of security product spending — 69 percent — by 2016.

Available now, the Sprint Lookout app can pinpoint a lost or stolen device on a map and make the phone sound an alarm. (Busted!) The Premium version can additionally inform users about which of their apps can access their private data; save user data to "the cloud" and restore it to a new or existing device; remotely lock a device or wipe out its data; protect a phone from malware, spyware and the like; and let a user remotely manage their device from the Lookout Web site.

The app is priced at $29.99 for the year or $2.99 a month. For the next week, however, Lookout is offering $5 off to Sprint subscribers who use the code STAYSAFE at checkout.

Research firm IDC expects 2011 smartphone sales to reach 472 million units, and for that figure to nearly double, to 982 million units, by the end of 2015. Tablet sales, per Gartner, are slated to hit 17.6 million units by years end, before leaping to 108 million-plus in 2012 and 294 million-plus in 2015.