When Mary Min (pictured) started with her current company and wanted to test the strength of a new security solution in an application environment, she had plenty of options ranging from healthcare to finance to “internet of things.” But the experienced developer knew exactly where she wanted to go first: gaming.

“People were a little puzzled, but it’s because gaming is the most complex thing that anyone could possibly make,” said Min, vice president of global business development at Seworks Inc., who described the multiple communications, graphics and artificial intelligence layers that comprise most gaming environments. “It contains pretty much every single piece of technology that you could ever know.”

Min visited theCUBE, SiliconANGLE’s mobile livestreaming studio, and spoke with host John Furrier (@furrier) during the Samsung Developer Conference in San Francisco, California. They discussed app security and the evolution of the gaming industry’s content versus hardware model.

Security for mobile apps

The rigorous testing that can be applied in a gaming environment is also important to Min because Seworks is assisting developers with security. Her company builds technology to protect mobile apps from dangerous hacking.

“We outfit you with an incredible shield that protects your application when it ships to the public,” Min said. “Just think of us as your on-call hackers.”

Part of building a secure infrastructure for mobile apps involves permissions, controls over the capabilities or information an app can access. A growing problem is that app users will routinely ignore or quickly dismiss these digital gatekeepers. “Your average consumer is not very privacy sensitive,” Min said. “Alarmingly, for the number of apps that we look at, the [low] number of permissions that they ask is kind of scary.”

A veteran of the game development industry for nearly 20 years, Min has witnessed the evolution of a business model where content drove hardware adoption. When Microsoft first introduced the Xbox in 2001, the software giant took a financial bath on every system it sold. Then along came “Halo,” one of the first certified gaming hits, followed by the mega-successful “Call of Duty” series. Microsoft’s hardware distribution problem had been magically solved.

“Outside of solving your basic human needs of shelter, food, sleep and clothing, what’s the immediate next thing that you want to do? People want to be entertained,” Min said. “Gaming is life, and life is games.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Samsung Developer Conference.

Photo: SiliconANGLE