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Fraudulent behaviors in Google Android app market fuel search rank abuse and malware proliferation. We present FairPlay, a novel system that uncovers both malware and search rank fraud apps, by picking out trails that fraudsters leave…
The Google Play marketplace has introduced the Data Safety section to improve transparency regarding how mobile applications (apps) collect, share, and protect user data. This mechanism requires developers to disclose privacy and…
Instant Messaging (IM) applications like Telegram, Signal, and WhatsApp have become extremely popular in recent years. Unfortunately, such IM services have been targets of continuous governmental surveillance and censorship, as these…
LLM applications (i.e., LLM apps) leverage the powerful capabilities of LLMs to provide users with customized services, revolutionizing traditional application development. While the increasing prevalence of LLM-powered applications…
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…
In today's mobile application marketplace, the ability of consumers to make informed choices regarding their privacy is extremely limited. Consumers largely rely on privacy policies and app permission mechanisms, but these do an inadequate…
In the past year, a new spamming scheme has emerged: sexual extortion messages requiring payments in the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, also known as sextortion. This scheme represents a first integration of the use of cryptocurrencies by members…
End-users seldom read verbose privacy policies, leading app stores like Google Play to mandate simplified data safety declarations as a user-friendly alternative. However, these self-declared disclosures often contradict the full privacy…
Due to Android's open source feature and low barriers to entry for developers, millions of developers and third-party organizations have been attracted into the Android ecosystem. However, over 90 percent of mobile malware are found…
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…
The decentralization, redundancy, and pseudo-anonymity features have made permission-less public blockchain platforms attractive for adoption as technology platforms for cryptocurrencies. However, such adoption has enabled cybercriminals to…
Desktop browser extensions have long allowed users to improve their experience online and tackle widespread harms on websites. So far, no equivalent solution exists for mobile apps, despite the fact that individuals now spend significantly…
Due to the pseudo-anonymity of the Bitcoin network, users can hide behind their bitcoin addresses that can be generated in unlimited quantity, on the fly, without any formal links between them. Thus, it is being used for payment transfer by…
Due to the decentralized and public nature of the Blockchain ecosystem, the malicious activities on the Ethereum platform impose immeasurable losses for the users. Existing phishing scam detection methods mostly rely only on the analysis of…
The scheme of application (app) distribution systems involving incentivized third-party app vendors is a desirable option for the emerging edge computing systems. However, such a scheme also brings various security challenges as faced by…
Internet users and businesses are increasingly using online social networks (OSN) to drive audience traffic and increase their popularity. In order to boost social presence, OSN users need to increase the visibility and reach of their…
The super app paradigm, exemplified by platforms such as WeChat and AliPay, has revolutionized the mobile app landscape by enabling third-party developers to deploy add-ons within these apps. These add-ons, known as miniapps, leverage user…
Mobile applications (a.k.a., apps), which facilitate a large variety of tasks on mobile devices, have become indispensable in our everyday lives. Accomplishing a task may require the user to navigate among various apps. Unlike Web pages…
The underground exploitation of large language models (LLMs) for malicious services (i.e., Malla) is witnessing an uptick, amplifying the cyber threat landscape and posing questions about the trustworthiness of LLM technologies. However,…
Coordinated information operations remain a persistent challenge on social media, despite platform efforts to curb them. While previous research has primarily focused on identifying these operations within individual platforms, this study…