Book Image

Mobile Device Exploitation Cookbook

By : Akshay Dixit
Book Image

Mobile Device Exploitation Cookbook

By: Akshay Dixit

Overview of this book

Mobile attacks are on the rise. We are adapting ourselves to new and improved smartphones, gadgets, and their accessories, and with this network of smart things, come bigger risks. Threat exposure increases and the possibility of data losses increase. Exploitations of mobile devices are significant sources of such attacks. Mobile devices come with different platforms, such as Android and iOS. Each platform has its own feature-set, programming language, and a different set of tools. This means that each platform has different exploitation tricks, different malware, and requires a unique approach in regards to forensics or penetration testing. Device exploitation is a broad subject which is widely discussed, equally explored by both Whitehats and Blackhats. This cookbook recipes take you through a wide variety of exploitation techniques across popular mobile platforms. The journey starts with an introduction to basic exploits on mobile platforms and reverse engineering for Android and iOS platforms. Setup and use Android and iOS SDKs and the Pentesting environment. Understand more about basic malware attacks and learn how the malware are coded. Further, perform security testing of Android and iOS applications and audit mobile applications via static and dynamic analysis. Moving further, you'll get introduced to mobile device forensics. Attack mobile application traffic and overcome SSL, before moving on to penetration testing and exploitation. The book concludes with the basics of platforms and exploit tricks on BlackBerry and Windows Phone. By the end of the book, you will be able to use variety of exploitation techniques across popular mobile platforms with stress on Android and iOS.
Table of Contents (11 chapters)
Mobile Device Exploitation Cookbook
Credits
About the Authors
About the Reviewer
www.PacktPub.com
Preface

Analyzing an Android malware sample


Let's begin by analyzing a simple Android-based malware application, called Android.Dogowar. This malware is a repackaged version of the Android gaming application Dog Wars, which was downloadable from a third-party app store and had to be manually installed on an Android device during analysis.

Dog Wars was a game where users could breed, train, and fight with virtual dogs. This game caused an outcry from animal rights protestors through public outcry and write-in campaigns. After these attempts seemed to have little effect on convincing the developers to discontinue the app, a group of protestors targeted end users to get their message across.

The original Dog Wars app (Beta 0.981) was repackaged as malware and placed on several third-party app stores for download.

During installation, the malware app requested that users grant SMS permission, among others.

Upon installation, the display icon of the malware looked almost identical to that of the legitimate...