CRII: SaTC: A Language Based Approach to Hybrid Mobile App Security

在过去的几年里，混合移动应用在全球的份额出现了爆炸性的增长，与HTML5日益普遍的情况不谋而合。混合应用程序框架允许移动开发人员仅使用Web技术来设计应用程序代码，并提供即时移植到几个移动平台所需的本机和桥接代码(用于访问设备资源的API)。这项研究将开发技术来缓解混合应用程序框架中的关键安全和隐私漏洞，方法是创建一个密封的安全模型，稳健地抵御桥接攻击，并将混合框架的总体攻击面降至最低。在一个日益依赖移动技术的全球社会中，移动应用安全构成了一项紧迫的责任，并影响到社会的几个部分，包括儿童。该项目将为迎接这一挑战作出重大贡献。从这个项目中获得的案例研究、实际案例和研究经验将被整合到研究生课程中，特别是网络安全方面的硕士和证书课程。此外，在该项目中开发的有趣的技术和例子将被纳入专门针对计算机领域妇女的课程，目的是吸引和留住更多从事计算机领域的妇女。这项研究将探索将强大的基于语言的安全技术、内联引用监控(IRM)和静态分析扩展到混合应用程序安全的新的和重要的问题领域。该研究有三个主要目标：1)定义混合应用程序攻击面的系统映射，并建立一类针对基于语言的有效强制执行的安全策略；2)将IRM方法应用于复杂的、跨平台的混合软件堆栈，包括有效的完整中介，以实现对监控系统的无缝保护和防篡改；3)设计有效的静态分析算法，以推断混合应用程序中页面的细粒度权限区域。这些权限区域将提高网桥访问的粒度，并作为安全策略模型集成到IRM框架中以进行实施。这些目标将有助于为混合应用程序建立自动保护技术，透明执行以保留安全应用程序的功能，以及追溯执行可应用于野外易受攻击的应用程序。

The last few years have seen an explosive growth in the share of hybrid mobile apps worldwide, coinciding with the increasing ubiquity of HTML5. Hybrid app frameworks allow mobile developers to design app code using web technologies alone, and supply native and bridge code (APIs for accessing device resources) necessary for instant porting to several mobile platforms.This research will develop techniques to mitigate critical security and privacy vulnerabilities in hybrid app frameworks, by creating an airtight security model robust against bridge exploits, and minimizing the overall attack surface of the hybrid framework. In a global society increasingly reliant on mobile technology, mobile app security constitutes a pressing responsibility, and impacts several sections of society, including children. This project will provide a significant contribution towards meeting this challenge. Case studies, practical examples, and research experience gained from this project will be integrated into graduate-level courses, especially Master's and certificate programs in cyber-security. Additionally, interesting techniques and examples developed in this project will be incorporated into curricula specifically targeted for women in computing initiatives, with the objective of attracting and retaining more women in computing fields. This research will explore extension of powerful language-based security techniques, in-lined reference monitoring (IRM) and static analysis, to the novel and significant problem domain of hybrid app security. The research has three major goals: 1) defining a systematic mapping of the hybrid app attack surface, and establishing a class of security policies that target effective language-based enforcement; 2) adapting the IRM approach to the complex, cross-platform hybrid software stack, including effective complete mediation for seamless protection and tamper-proofing of the monitoring system; 3) designing an effective static-analysis algorithm to infer fine-grained permissions-regions for pages in a hybrid app. These permissions regions will improve bridge access granularity, and serve as security policy models for integration into the IRM framework for enforcement. These goals will serve towards building automatic protection technologies for hybrid apps, transparent enforcement that preserves the functionality of safe apps, and retroactive enforcement that can be applied to vulnerable apps in the wild.