Security News > 2020 > April > Large number of mobile apps may be vulnerable to hacking

A team of cybersecurity researchers has discovered that a large number of mobile apps contain hardcoded secrets allowing others to access private data or block content provided by users.

The study's findings: that the apps on mobile phones might have hidden or harmful behaviors about which end users know little to nothing, said Zhiqiang Lin, an associate professor of computer science and engineering at The Ohio State University and senior author of the study.

Typically, mobile apps engage with users by processing and responding to user input, Lin said.

He said, motivated attackers could reverse engineer the mobile apps to discover them.

"A key reason why mobile apps contain these 'backdoor secrets' is because developers misplaced the trust," Zhao said.

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