Whether it is for paying your electricity bills, booking a hotel, or any other online s, mobile apps have become an integral part of our day-to-day interactions in this digitally connected world. The development of Android applications are just the beginning of the story, as it is the phase of app launch that takes several activities and tasks that are more challenging.
As you build your Android application and work on your mobile strategy, it’s important to test your appl over various parameters like security, compatibility, performance, functionality and a lot more. As marketing has been a crucial factor, many businesses tend to neglect the testing part before launching the app.
Here’s an ultimate Android Security check-list for all your application before launching it into the market. And even if you already have one, it’s good to check it once over again.
1. Robust Registration and Activation:
Successful registration and activation of your Android application isn’t a process of submitting your completed program and sitting back, watching the cash flowing in. There are many steps that needs to be taken care of before the last build and after the first download. For example, if your application is intended to generate a good revenue, you must first set up a Google Merchant Account.
Further read and get familiar with the Google Play Store policies and terms before registration. Any violations may lead to suspension of your services.
2. Use Android Application Sandbox:
Each Android application runs in a sandbox. Because of this reason, apps must explicitly share resources and data among themselves. Using an Android application sandbox ensures isolation of your app data and code execution from other apps.
3. Using Encrypted File System:
Encrypting your program, in other words, file system permissions ensures that, one user cannot access data of another user in the app. Unless the developer shares files externally one application details cannot be accessed by the another.
4. Storing Critical Information:
In Android devices, data is securely stored that externally no one can extract data from the app. Files created and stored on an external devices are readable and writeable globally. Since, any external device can be modified or removed by a user, avoid keeping your sensitive file data on external disks.
If by any chance, your application retrieves files from an external device, make sure it is cryptographically verified and signed prior to the dynamic loading of the application.
5. Use Networking:
Transactions through the network can sometimes be tricky and risky. People nowadays are very much concerned about security measures taken during transactions that deal with critical information related to their finance. Practices like using IP networking, telephone networking, handling user data etc. should be taken diligent care of to avoid any problems that might affect your app.
6. Securing your Native Code:
In Java security, large amount native code in the JDK is like an important factor. Using native code with Android SDK is preferred than using Android NDK. Applications that are built using the native code are less portable, more complex and tend to include errors such as buffer overflows. For long run programmes, every native code should be ported on to Java which is safer than other languages.
Conclusion:
Thousands of Android apps are published on the Google Play Store every day. Yet, most of the players fail to make it to the finals. The efforts, money and time you put in building the application is huge. Once your app is up, you would hardly find a second chance to prove the worth of it. So, ensure you follow this security check-list during your app development phase.