android on irq5 test

Android Internals: Package Verifiers

Mon, 01 Dec 2014 22:50:00 +0000

Inspired by Nikolay Elenkov’s detailed technical posts on Android Explorations, I decided to dig into the Android source code myself and document the package verification mechanism in Android.

Package verification was introduced in Android 4.2 to allow for apps to be verified or checked before they are installed. If you have tried to install a malicious app on a production Android device, you might have seen the following screen, displayed by the verifier:

Android was built in such a way that it tries to be generic for third-parties to implement stuff. Package verification is a feature that is currently only used and implemented by Google, but it is abstracted in such a way that any manufacturer can implement their own. Documentation and examples on how to do this is almost non-existent, although anyone determined enough can read the Android source code and figure it out for themselves.

Decoding BCARD Conference Badges

Sat, 13 Apr 2013 01:28:00 +0000

Last month, I had the opportunity to fly halfway around the world to attend RSA Conference 2013. Everyone was given a lanyard and badge which contains your information entered during registration. When you visit booths, they can then scan your badge to collect your information and follow up by sending you spam.

The scanner varies across different booths, but mostly it’s an Android device that ran a custom software. Since it had a large NXP logo, let’s try to read it with the NFC TagInfo app. Looks like the tag identifies itself as a NDEF message but the data is gibberish.

How to take a screenshot

Sat, 05 Jun 2010 14:50:00 +0000

That’s it!