English

A certified reference validation mechanism for the permission model of Android

Programming Languages 2017-09-13 v1 Cryptography and Security

Abstract

Android embodies security mechanisms at both OS and application level. In this platform application security is built primarily upon a system of permissions which specify restrictions on the operations a particular process can perform. The critical role of these security mechanisms makes them a prime target for (formal) verification. We present an idealized model of a reference monitor of the novel mechanisms of Android 6 (and further), where it is possible to grant permissions at run time. Using the programming language of the proof-assistant Coq we have developed a functional implementation of the reference validation mechanism and certified its correctness with respect to the specified reference monitor. Several properties concerning the permission model of Android 6 and its security mechanisms have been formally formulated and proved. Applying the program extraction mechanism provided by Coq we have also derived a certified Haskell prototype of the reference validation mechanism.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1709.03652,
  title  = {A certified reference validation mechanism for the permission model of Android},
  author = {Gustavo Betarte and Juan Campo and Felipe Gorostiaga and Carlos Luna},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1709.03652},
  year   = {2017}
}

Comments

Pre-proceedings paper presented at the 27th International Symposium on Logic-Based Program Synthesis and Transformation (LOPSTR 2017), Namur, Belgium, 10-12 October 2017 (arXiv:1708.07854)

R2 v1 2026-06-22T21:39:47.371Z