Security apps gaining ground in China

Beijing Big Data's report also revealed that a resounding 82.7 percent of respondents said they were concerned about their mobile phone security, especially as more look to use their devices to make payments online.

Just over half (53.2 percent) of those asked said cold calls by advertisers or other spam messages was the most frequent problem they encountered, and the most annoying.

The report claimed some 8.33 million unwanted phone calls were registered in China during the first half of last year, mostly commercial promotions from real estate agents.

The 360 Mobile Security system itself claimed to have intercepted 38.56 billion spam messages in the first six months of last year of which 120 million were reported by users. The majority (77.6 percent) were advertisements, with the rest classed as illegal information or fraud messages.

Jiang Xuerou is sales manager of a Shanghai-based textile manufacturing company, who has been on the receiving end of many mobile phone spam messages.

"I am harassed every day by phone calls or spam messages－from small vendors selling clothes or cosmetics, or property agents selling apartments, or sales representatives selling insurance products－that are often just automatic calls made in foreign accents speaking poor Chinese.

"Annoyingly, some come late at night－just one beep can disrupt my sleep. That's why I need a trustworthy mobile phone security app to save me from all this hassle."