SAAC: Secure Android Application Context a Runtime Based Policy and its Architecture

Abstract

A smartphone runtime environment consists of multiple entities with different goals and scope. Indeed, critical applications such as banking applications that make contactless payments, share the same environment with other applications of varying levels of trust. This paper presents a novel approach allowing a standard Android user to launch its applications in a configurable secure execution context. The security rules defined for each application are enforced by a dedicated security architecture implemented in several parts of the Android ecosystem. A performance assessment of the solution is also provided.