Related papers: A Self-Compiling Android Data Obfuscation Tool
String obfuscation is an established technique used by proprietary, closed-source applications to protect intellectual property. Furthermore, it is also frequently used to hide spyware or malware in applications. In both cases, the…
Mobile devices have become ubiquitous due to centralization of private user information, contacts, messages and multiple sensors. Google Android, an open-source mobile Operating System (OS), is currently the market leader. Android…
Mobile apps are predominantly integrated with cloud services to benefit from enhanced functionalities. Adopting authentication using secrets such as API keys is crucial to ensure secure mobile-cloud interactions. However, developers often…
Android employs a permission framework that empowers users to either accept or deny sharing their private data (for example, location) with an app. However, many apps tend to crash when they are denied permission, leaving users no choice…
Limited by the small keyboard, most mobile apps support the automatic login feature for better user experience. Therefore, users avoid the inconvenience of retyping their ID and password when an app runs in the foreground again. However,…
Android applications are frequently plagiarized or repackaged, and software obfuscation is a recommended protection against these practices. However, there is very little data on the overall rates of app obfuscation, the techniques used, or…
Software obfuscation is widely used by Android developers to protect the source code of their applications against adversarial reverse-engineering efforts. A specific type of obfuscation, string obfuscation, transforms the content of all…
In this paper, we seek to better understand Android obfuscation and depict a holistic view of the usage of obfuscation through a large-scale investigation in the wild. In particular, we focus on four popular obfuscation approaches:…
By offering sophisticated services and centralizing a huge volume of personal data, modern smartphones changed the way we socialize, entertain and work. To this aim, they rely upon complex hardware/software frameworks leading to a number of…
With the number of new mobile malware instances increasing by over 50\% annually since 2012 [24], malware embedding in mobile apps is arguably one of the most serious security issues mobile platforms are exposed to. While obfuscation…
Security of Android devices is now paramount, given their wide adoption among consumers. As researchers develop tools for statically or dynamically detecting suspicious apps, malware writers regularly update their attack mechanisms to hide…
Data hiding is the art of hiding secret data into a cover object such as digital image for covert communication. In this paper, we make the first step towards hiding ``data hiding'', which is totally different from many conventional works…
Android apps must work correctly even if their execution is interrupted by external events. For instance, an app must work properly even if a phone call is received, or after its layout is redrawn because the smartphone has been rotated.…
Many Android applications collect data from users. When they do, they must protect this collected data according to the current legal frameworks. Such data protection has become even more important since the European Union rolled out the…
In recent years, stealthy Android malware has increasingly adopted sophisticated techniques to bypass automatic detection mechanisms and harden manual analysis. Adversaries typically rely on obfuscation, anti-repacking, steganography,…
Information seeking on mobile devices is often fragmented, trapping users in repetitive cycles of context switching and data re-entry, which increases cognitive load and disrupts workflow. Existing mobile agents provide limited cross-source…
With the popularity of Android apps, different techniques have been proposed to enhance app protection. As an effective approach to prevent reverse engineering, obfuscation can be used to serve both benign and malicious purposes. In recent…
Mobile applications (hereafter, apps) collect a plethora of information regarding the user behavior and his device through third-party analytics libraries. However, the collection and usage of such data raised several privacy concerns,…
Since last decade, smartphones have become an integral part of everyone's life. Having the ability to handle many useful and attractive applications, smartphones sport flawless functionality and small sizes leading to their exponential…
STEALTH is a method for using some AI-generated model, without suffering from malicious attacks (i.e. lying) or associated unfairness issues. After recursively bi-clustering the data, STEALTH system asks the AI model a limited number of…