Apex: extending Android permission model and enforcement with user-defined runtime constraints

Android is the first mass-produced consumer-market open source mobile platform that allows developers to easily create applications and users to readily install them. However, giving users the ability to install third-party applications poses serious security concerns. While the existing security mechanism in Android allows a mobile phone user to see which resources an application requires, she has no choice but to allow access to all the requested permissions if she wishes to use the applications. There is no way of granting some permissions and denying others. Moreover, there is no way of restricting the usage of resources based on runtime constraints such as the location of the device or the number of times a resource has been previously used. In this paper, we present Apex

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2010
• Where: CCS
• Authors: Mohammad Nauman, Sohail Khan, Xinwen Zhang
• Keywords: Android, CCS 2010, Mobile Platforms, Security Mechanism, Security Privacy