Book Image

Android Application Security Essentials

By : Pragati Rai
Book Image

Android Application Security Essentials

By: Pragati Rai

Overview of this book

In today's techno-savvy world, more and more parts of our lives are going digital, and all this information is accessible anytime and anywhere using mobile devices. It is of the utmost importance that you understand and implement security in your apps that will reduce the likelihood of hazards that will wreck your users' experience. "Android Application Security Essentials" takes a deep look into Android security from kernel to the application level, with practical hands-on examples, illustrations, and everyday use cases. This book will show you how to overcome the challenge of getting the security of your applications right. "Android Application Security Essentials" will show you how to secure your Android applications and data. It will equip you with tricks and tips that will come in handy as you develop your applications.We will start by learning the overall security architecture of the Android stack. Securing components with permissions, defining security in a manifest file, cryptographic algorithms and protocols on the Android stack, secure storage, security focused testing, and protecting enterprise data on your device is then also discussed in detail. You will also learn how to be security-aware when integrating newer technologies like NFC and mobile payments into your Android applications. At the end of this book, you will understand Android security at the system level all the way to the nitty-gritty details of application security for securing your Android applications.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
Android Application Security Essentials
Credits
Foreword
About the Author
About the Reviewer
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
Index

Advances in hardware


Mobile operating systems have come a long way. When I started working on mobiles, we had candy bar phones that did little more than make phone calls and had basic utilities such as calculator and a widget to show the time and date. To support the advanced use cases for mobile, security has to be built in the hardware itself. There are some efforts in this direction that I have discussed in the following sections.

Hardware security module

Hardware security module, also called a secure element, is a piece of hardware (chip) embedded in the hardware to store cryptographic keys and other sensitive information. The idea is to provide an isolated, tamper resistant environment to store PII. In some cases, a secure element can be carried with the device as well. Examples of secure elements include an enhanced SIM card controlled by a mobile network operator, a chip embedded in the device itself, or a micro SD card with a special circuit built-in. Many Android phones come equipped...