Over the last few years, mobile apps have become an integral part of our lives from ordering food, booking tickets, banking, online shopping and so on. User data of these mobile apps are very sensitive and hence causes huge loss if it falls into wrong hands. In this digital age, cybersecurity breaches and attacks are becoming very common. Hence, it is necessary to secure the user data. Here we came with some mobile app security best practices. But before digging into it let us see what is mobile app security and security threats in ios and android apps.
What Is Mobile App Security?
Mobile app security testing focuses on security posture of mobile apps on different platforms such as iOS, Windows, Android. It involves assessing apps for security issues in the context of platforms at which they are designed to run, framework that is developed with and anticipated set of users. Mobile apps plays important role in online presence of business and lots of businesses rely on mobile applications to connect with users. App breaches can be related to issues such as storing user’s data without encryption on a local database, session token change and so on.
Mobile App Security Testing Checklist OWASP-
1. Insecure Data Storage-
Mobile devices may get lost or stolen and hence malicious attackers can easily access data. Sensitive data can be extracted by the piece of malware or the attacker can exploit the vulnerabilities which results in data leak and access to sensitive data.
Solution- Create a threat model to know what information is processed by application and how API handles the data. Assess whether applied encryption is effective and protect the encryption keys. Implement technologies to protect against tampering by obfuscation, buffer overflow, avoid caching/data storing, deploy sound.
2. Insecure Authentication-
Mobile applications should authenticate the identity of users before allowing access. Authentication bypasses are frequently carried out by exploiting existing flaws like mobile app’s backend server’s incorrect validation of service requests. Mobile applications must verify and retain user identity, especially when transmitting sensitive data such as banking information.
Solution- Avoid the use of local authentication methods. Reassign this task to the server and only download app data after authentication. Also, avoid the use of vulnerable authentication methods like device identification, saving passwords locally, apply multi-factor authentication and follow general best practices.
3. Code Tampering-
Sometimes ecommerce apps contain manipulated mobile app versions. Modified app is an example where a hacker changes the binary of an app to include malicious content, install a backdoor etc. Haacker can re-sign these falsified apps to third-party app stores and publish modified versions. Also, you can send them directly to the victim through a phishing attack, to get them to download the app.
Solution- For the build, prop the ro. build.tags=test keys that show build of a programmer or non-official ROM. Check for several known rooted apks., attempt SU command directly.
iOS Mobile App Vulnerabilities-
1. Zero Day System Vulnerabilities-
It has been discovered but not made public. Using a remote exploitation technique, these vulnerabilities lead to silent installation of attacks like mRATs on a device. Once the attacker may be able to steal passwords, company data and emails and record all keyboard and screen activity. They could also use the phone as a botnet to steal contacts or text messages. AV solutions that depend on known attack patterns to detect attacks, are not able to protect against unknown attacks. Businesses need a solution that can detect any suspicious behavior from an app, a device or the network to find and mitigate the impact of zero-day mobile attacks.
2. iOS Survellience And Mobile Remote Access Trojans(mRATs)-
These assaults jailbreak the smartphone, removing built-in security features and install mRAT software, allowing the attacker to take control of the phone. iOS software from the app store can be loaded on the device once it has been jailbroken. Users unwittingly download these apps and become infected with mRATs. There is no mobile antivirus that can defend from types of attacks. Issue is made worse by the fact that jailbreak can be readily hidden from Mobile device management(MDM) solutions. Well known forums like xCon, for instance, freely disclose strategies to avoid MDM detection. All that is required is a mechanism to tell when a device has been jailbroken and capacity to spot surveillance activity.
3. WiFi Man In The Middle Attack-
Whenever a mobile connects to a rogue WiFi hotspot, a MitM attack occurs. Due to the communications run through an attacker-controlled network device, they can listen in on and change the network’s communication. MitM attacks have always been an issue for wireless devices, however increased use of smartphones have become far more appealing targets for this attack. Due to the limited screen size of mobiles, URLs are generally hidden from users, who don’t verify that the URL the browser is referring to is the correct one. Best way to protect from such issues is to use a VPN to encrypt and isolate communication. To maximize the user experience, VPN should be activated just when rogue hotspots and other dangerous factors are detected.
Android Mobile App Security Vulnerabilities-
As the android ecosystem is open source, there are more chances of data breaches on the operational level. As the android is so fragmented, new versions of the system are only slowly deployed to customer’s devices, stifling the security of the system. Let’s have a look at android app security problems.
1. App Permissions-
Most of the users easily press the “Access” button when the app requests certain rights. Thus, what makes this security risk? Providing specific permissions to an app, users are authorizing app to access private and sensitive data on their android smartphones. As a result, when it comes to android app development, developers should strive to construct applications that need as minimal permissions as feasible.
2. Android Fragmentation Risks-
While building a strong security solution, fragmentation is the main issue that android app development services encounter. Generally android apps have multiple versions hence, it becomes difficult for app developers to create a solution which works for all of them. Also, users don’t always upgrade their android devices to the most recent version, causing some security measures to fail. It is important to note that android devices that haven’t been updated are vulnerable to security issues and malware attacks.
3. OS Customization-
Though it may appear usual, customizing the operating system is a security risk for android apps. Customization of the OS to make it more practical, comfortable, or user-friendly is very common. Whereas, some users have a habit of modifying the OS by integrating launchers and customization layers. It leads to security issues, hence customizing the OS is a major issue in Android app development.
Best Practices To Improve Mobile App Data Security-
Mobile app security best practices ensure that the application is free from risks and doesn’t reveal the user’s personal information. Before the software is posted to an app store for public use, programmers must ensure that all security tests are completed. Here are some of the mobile app security best practices.
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