Communication-Based Attacks Detection in Android Applications

The Android operating system provides a rich Inter-Component Communication (ICC) method that brings enormous convenience. However, the Android ICC also increases security risks. To address this problem, a formal method is proposed to model and detect inter-component communication behavior in Android applications. Firstly, we generate data flow graphs and data facts for each component through component-level data flow analysis. Secondly, our approach treats ICC just like method calls. After analyzing the fields and data dependencies of the intent, we identify the ICC caller and callee, track the data flow between them, and construct the ICC model. Thirdly, the behavior model of Android applications is constructed by a formal mapping method for component data flow graph based on Pi calculus. The runtime sensitive path trigger detection algorithm is then given. Communication-based attacks are detected by analyzing intent abnormity. Finally, we analyze the modeling and detection efficiency, and compare it with relevant methods. Analysis of 57 real-world applications partly verifies the effectiveness of the proposed method.