Home // International Journal On Advances in Security, volume 8, numbers 1 and 2, 2015 // View article

Integrated Technologies for Communication Security and Secure Deletion on Android Smartphones

Authors:
Alexandre Braga
Daniela Schwab
Eduardo Morais
Romulo Neto
André Vannucci

Keywords: cryptography; surveillance; security; Android; instant message; secure deletion; secure storage; encrypted file system; flash memory

Abstract:
Nowadays, mobile devices are powerful enough to accomplish most of the tasks previously accomplished only by personal computers; that includes, for example, file management and instant messaging. On the other hand, in order to protect final user’s interests, there is also an increasing need for security hardenings on ordinary, off-the-shelf devices. In fact, there is a need for practical security technologies that work at the application level, above the operating system and under the control of the user. This technology has to be easy to use in everyday activities and easily integrated into mobile devices with minimal maintenance and installation costs. The main contribution of this paper is to describe design and implementation issues concerning the construction of an integrated framework for securing both communication and storage of sensitive information of Android smartphones. Four aspects of the framework are detailed in this paper: the construction of a cryptographic library, its use in the development of a cryptographically secure instant message service, the integration with an encrypted file system, and the addition of secure deletion technologies. Also, an analysis of non-standard cryptography is provided, as well as performance evaluation of a novel secure deletion technique. The proposed framework is supposed to work in user-mode, as an ordinary group of mobile apps, without root access, with no need for operating system modification, in everyday devices.

Pages: 28 to 47

Copyright: Copyright (c) to authors, 2015. Used with permission.

Publication date: June 30, 2015

Published in: journal

ISSN: 1942-2636