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The privacy of personal information has received significant attention in mobile software. Although previous researchers have designed some methods to identify the conflict between app behavior and privacy policies, little is known about…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2023-09-12 Kaifa Zhao , Xian Zhan , Le Yu , Shiyao Zhou , Hao Zhou , Xiapu Luo , Haoyu Wang , Yepang Liu

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,…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2022-02-01 Davide Caputo , Francesco Pagano , Giovanni Bottino , Luca Verderame , Alessio Merlo

Numerous studies demonstrated that browser fingerprinting is detrimental to users' security and privacy. However, little is known about the effects of browser fingerprinting on Android hybrid apps -- where a stripped-down Chromium browser…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2022-08-04 Abhishek Tiwari , Jyoti Prakash , Alimerdan Rahimov , Christian Hammer

Mobile gaming applications (apps) have become increasingly pervasive, including a growing number of games designed for children. Despite their popularity, these apps often integrate complex analytics, advertising, and attribution…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-03-31 Bakheet Aljedaani

Third-party security apps are an integral part of the Android app ecosystem. Many users install them as an extra layer of protection for their devices. There are hundreds of such security apps, both free and paid in Google Play Store and…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2020-07-09 Weixian Yao , Yexuan Li , Weiye Lin , Tianhui Hu , Imran Chowdhury , Rahat Masood , Suranga Seneviratne

Third-party Software Development Kits (SDKs) are widely adopted in Android app development, to effortlessly accelerate development pipelines and enhance app functionality. However, this convenience raises substantial concerns about…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2025-06-19 Mark Huasong Meng , Chuan Yan , Qing Zhang , Zeyu Wang , Kailong Wang , Sin Gee Teo , Guangdong Bai , Jin Song Dong

The proliferation of mobile applications and the subsequent sharing of personal data with service and application providers have given rise to substantial privacy concerns. Application marketplaces have introduced mechanisms to conform to…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2023-11-02 Joao Marono , Catarina Silva , Joao P. Barraca , Vitor Cunha , Paulo Salvador

With smartphone technologies enhanced way of interacting with the world around us, it has also been paving the way for easier access to our private and personal information. This has been amplified by the existence of numerous embedded…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2020-07-10 Tanusree Sharma , Masooda Bashir

With millions of apps that can be downloaded from official or third-party market, Android has become one of the most popular mobile platforms today. These apps help people in all kinds of ways and thus have access to lots of user's data…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2014-11-11 Xiangyu Liu , Zhe Zhou , Wenrui Diao , Zhou Li , Kehuan Zhang

Bystander privacy in smart homes has been widely studied in Western contexts, yet it remains underexplored in non-Western countries such as China. In this study, we analyze 49 Chinese smart home apps using a mixed-methods approach,…

Human-Computer Interaction · Computer Science 2026-02-11 Shijing He , Xuchen Wang , Yaxiong Lei , Chi Zhang , Ruba Abu-Salma , Jose Such

Online advertisers and analytics services (or trackers), are constantly tracking users activities as they access web services either through browsers or a mobile apps. Numerous tools such as browser plugins and specialized mobile apps have…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2017-09-13 Muhammad Ikram , Mohamed Ali Kaafar

Parental control applications, software tools designed to manage and monitor children's online activities, serve as essential safeguards for parents in the digital age. However, their usage has sparked concerns about security and privacy…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2025-04-24 Eva-Maria Maier , Leonie Maria Tanczer , Lukas Daniel Klausner

Smartphone apps usually have access to sensitive user data such as contacts, geo-location, and account credentials and they might share such data to external entities through the Internet or with other apps. Confidentiality of user data…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2018-12-20 Biniam Fisseha Demissie , Mariano Ceccato , Lwin Khin Shar

We present an analysis of 12 million instances of privacy-relevant reviews publicly visible on the Google Play Store that span a 10 year period. By leveraging state of the art NLP techniques, we examine what users have been writing about…

Machine Learning · Computer Science 2024-03-19 Omer Akgul , Sai Teja Peddinti , Nina Taft , Michelle L. Mazurek , Hamza Harkous , Animesh Srivastava , Benoit Seguin

Smartphone technology has drastically improved over the past decade. These improvements have seen the creation of specialized health applications, which offer consumers a range of health-related activities such as tracking and checking…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2021-07-30 I Wayan Budi Sentana , Muhammad Ikram , Mohamed Ali Kaafar , Shlomo Berkovsky

In the age of ubiquitous technologies, security- and privacy-focused choices have turned out to be a significant concern for individuals and organizations. Risks of such pervasive technologies are extensive and often misaligned with user…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2020-07-01 Behnood Momenzadeh , Shakthidhar Gopavaram , Sanchari Das , L Jean Camp

The digital age has brought a world of opportunity to children. Connectivity can be a game-changer for some of the world's most marginalized children. However, while legislatures around the world have enacted regulations to protect…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2023-03-17 Ruoxi Sun , Minhui Xue , Gareth Tyson , Shuo Wang , Seyit Camtepe , Surya Nepal

China is one of the largest Android markets in the world. As Chinese users cannot access Google Play to buy and install Android apps, a number of independent app stores have emerged and compete in the Chinese app market. Some of the Chinese…

Networking and Internet Architecture · Computer Science 2018-10-19 Haoyu Wang , Zhe Liu , Jingyue Liang , Narseo Vallina-Rodriguez , Yao Guo , Li Li , Juan Tapiador , Jingcun Cao , Guoai Xu

Privacy regulations protect and promote the privacy of individuals by requiring mobile apps to provide a privacy policy that explains what personal information is collected and how these apps process this information. However, developers…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2023-09-27 Shidong Pan , Dawen Zhang , Mark Staples , Zhenchang Xing , Jieshan Chen , Xiwei Xu , James Hoang

Mobile Graphical User Interface (GUI) agents have demonstrated strong capabilities in automating complex smartphone tasks by leveraging multimodal large language models (MLLMs) and system-level control interfaces. However, this paradigm…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-04-28 Lepeng Zhao , Zhenhua Zou , Shuo Li , Zhuotao Liu