How to Clear Cache on Android Phones in Just One Click!

Описание: How to Clear Cache on Android Phones in Just One Click!

Abstract:
Android developers cache data to improve the performance of their applications. Caching is the technique of transparently storing data such that future requests can be accessed more quickly. At times when a mobile device is not under heavy use the cached data, including sensitive data, can remain on the device for an extensive period of time. This poses a security risk, especially when developers do not take the necessary security measures to protect their users' sensitive information. While there does exist ways to clear application caches built within the Android operating system and third-party applications, these approaches require the user to manually perform these tasks. This paper presents a dynamic cache cleaner that more aggressively pushes out unused cache data. We also present other possible solutions to more effectively manage the cache.

A lot of privacy data are generated by using mobile social networking applications (MSNAs) and the values of user’s privacy data in those applications increase with the establishment and development of big data platform, which makes MSNAs the primary target to be analyzed. Therefore, it is important to analyze privacy leakage and protect user’s privacy in the MSNAs. However, the existing approaches of data leakage detection in the Android platform are not suitable for MSNAs, e.g. VetDroid are considered as an impractical means since they require users’ frequent participation; TaintDroid and the detection methods based on it require the modification of Android system or the modification and re-package of the application, so the cost of the experiment will increase, and the operating efficiency of the application will decrease apparently. In this paper, we propose a privacy leakage detection tool named X-Decaf (X-Posed based Detection of Cache File) as well as an auto-protection method named ATFed (Automatic Transparent File Encryption/Decryption) in MSNAs on the Android platform. These two methods are designed to solve the above-mentioned issues under the conditions of keeping low coupling with the Android system and posing low impacts on the original MSNA.

Cache File Path.

As mentioned in Sect. 2.2, Android system will generate cache files in corresponding paths.
As the file storage paths can reflect the access permissions to a certain extent in Android system, we list some attack scenarios respectively.

DATA_PRI: Only the application itself can access the file path, the attackers cannot obtain the files without root permission;

DATA_PUB: Any application can access the file path and even maliciously tamper the file when it is global-readable;

SD_PUB, SD_PRI: The attackers can easily tamper a file in SD-card file directory, no matter it is private or public.

Note that the files in SD_PRI directory can be deleted with “CLEAR DATA” function under Android Settings, and unless the application manages by itself, the files in SD_PUB cannot be deleted directly. We distinguish files in SD_PRI directory from those in SD_PUB directory because it reflects the irregularities of developers.

Cache File Protection Status.
According to the analysis of the above mentioned attack scenarios, it is not qualified to guarantee the security of data generated during the application run-time only relying on the file directory security mechanisms provided by the Android system itself. With such protection measures as confusion, encryption, etc., files can be better protected. Even if an attacker broke through Android system protection and make access to the files, it will still take a great cost to restore the treated files. So, the cache file protection status should be taken into consideration and thus provide important foundation for analyzing privacy leakage.

Cache File Life-Cycle.
Cache file life-cycle contains the processes of cache files from generation, transfer, storage to deletion, during which they are under threat of hacker’s attacks. Therefore, it is important to have a good perspective into the life-cycle of cache files. Here is a summarization of scenario simulation of cache file life-cycle:

Case 1: The cache files are generated during the application run-time, and deleted after the application exits;

Case 2: The cache files still exist after the application exits, but the application provides related functions such as “clear cache” which can be executed to delete the cache files.

Case 3: The cache files still exist and cannot be deleted even with function “clear cache” provided by the application itself.

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