Mapping System Level Behaviors with Android APIs via System Call Dependence Graphs
This addresses security vulnerabilities in Android apps for users and developers, though it is an incremental improvement in malware detection methods.
The paper tackles the problem of over-privileged Android applications by mapping system-level behaviors to Android APIs using System Call Dependence Graphs, effectively identifying potential permission abuse with negligible performance impact.
Due to Android's open source feature and low barriers to entry for developers, millions of developers and third-party organizations have been attracted into the Android ecosystem. However, over 90 percent of mobile malware are found targeted on Android. Though Android provides multiple security features and layers to protect user data and system resources, there are still some over-privileged applications in Google Play Store or third-party Android app stores at wild. In this paper, we proposed an approach to map system level behavior and Android APIs, based on the observation that system level behaviors cannot be avoided but sensitive Android APIs could be evaded. To the best of our knowledge, our approach provides the first work to map system level behavior and Android APIs through System Call Dependence Graphs. The study also shows that our approach can effectively identify potential permission abusing, with almost negligible performance impact.