Google to Encrypt Android Cloud Backups With Your Lock Screen Password

Oct 15, 2018

In an effort to secure users’ data while maintaining privacy,
Google has announced a new security measure for
Android Backup Service that now encrypts all your backup data
stored on its cloud servers in a way that even the company can’t
read it.

Google allows Android users to automatically backup their
essential app data and settings to their Google account, allowing
them to simply restore it when required, instead of re-configuring
all the apps after formatting or switching to a new phone.

However, until now your backup data was not encrypted and
visible to Google, and now the company is going to change its
storage procedure.

Starting with Android Pie, Google is going to encrypt your Android
device backup data in the following way:

Step 1: Your Android device will generate a random secret
key (not known to Google),

Step 2: The secret key will then get encrypted using your
lockscreen PIN/pattern/passcode (not known to Google),

Step 3: This passcode-protected secret key will then
securely sent to a Titan security
chip ^[2] on Google’s servers,

So, your Android back data will get encrypted or decrypted only
if the lockscreen passcode get authorized through the Titan
security chip.

“The Titan chip is configured to only release the backup decryption
key when presented with a correct claim derived from the user’s
passcode,” Google writes.

In other words, the Titan security key will not decrypt any of your
backup data unless it detects the lockscreen passcode you have used
to request for decryption.
To prevent brute force attacks, Google’s Titan chip will
permanently block access to the backup data if someone inputs
incorrect passcode combinations several times in an attempt to
guess it.

“The limited number of incorrect attempts is strictly enforced by a
custom Titan firmware that cannot be updated without erasing the
contents of the chip,” Google says.

“By design, this means that no one (including Google) can access
a user’s backed-up application data without specifically knowing
their passcode.”

Google also hired cybersecurity and risk mitigation firm NCC Group
to perform a full security audit of the new Android Cloud
Backup/Restore feature. NCC discovered a few issues, which were
quickly fixed by the company.

Google has not yet confirmed that which Android smartphones will
be able to use this additional layer of security, but it is clear
that the device must be running the latest Android 9 Pie operating
system.

^[1]^[3]

References

^{^}
announced
(security.googleblog.com)
^{^}
Titan security chip
(thehackernews.com)
^{^}
discovered
(www.nccgroup.trust)

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OWASP TOP !0

Injection. Injection flaws, such as SQL, NoSQL, OS, and LDAP injection, occur when untrusted data is sent to an interpreter as part of a command or query. The attacker’s hostile data can trick the interpreter into executing unintended commands or accessing data without proper authorization. Broken Authentication. Application functions related to authentication and session management are often implemented incorrectly, allowing attackers to compromise passwords, keys, or session tokens, or to exploit other implementation flaws to assume other users’ identities temporarily or permanently. Sensitive Data Exposure. Many web applications and APIs do not properly protect sensitive data, such as financial, healthcare, and PII. Attackers may steal or modify such weakly protected data to conduct credit card fraud, identity theft, or other crimes. Sensitive data may be compromised without extra protection, such as encryption at rest or in transit, and requires special precautions when exchanged with the browser. XML External Entities (XXE). Many older or poorly configured XML processors evaluate external entity references within XML documents. External entities can be used to disclose internal files using the file URI handler, internal file shares, internal port scanning, remote code execution, and denial of service attacks. Broken Access Control. Restrictions on what authenticated users are allowed to do are often not properly enforced. Attackers can exploit these flaws to access unauthorized functionality and/or data, such as access other users’ accounts, view sensitive files, modify other users’ data, change access rights, etc. Security Misconfiguration. Security misconfiguration is the most commonly seen issue. This is commonly a result of insecure default configurations, incomplete or ad hoc configurations, open cloud storage, misconfigured HTTP headers, and verbose error messages containing sensitive information. Not only must all operating systems, frameworks, libraries, and applications be securely configured, but they must be patched/upgraded in a timely fashion. Cross-Site Scripting XSS. XSS flaws occur whenever an application includes untrusted data in a new web page without proper validation or escaping, or updates an existing web page with user-supplied data using a browser API that can create HTML or JavaScript. XSS allows attackers to execute scripts in the victim’s browser which can hijack user sessions, deface web sites, or redirect the user to malicious sites. Insecure Deserialization. Insecure deserialization often leads to remote code execution. Even if deserialization flaws do not result in remote code execution, they can be used to perform attacks, including replay attacks, injection attacks, and privilege escalation attacks. Using Components with Known Vulnerabilities. Components, such as libraries, frameworks, and other software modules, run with the same privileges as the application. If a vulnerable component is exploited, such an attack can facilitate serious data loss or server takeover. Applications and APIs using components with known vulnerabilities may undermine application defenses and enable various attacks and impacts. Insufficient Logging & Monitoring. Insufficient logging and monitoring, coupled with missing or ineffective integration with incident response, allows attackers to further attack systems, maintain persistence, pivot to more systems, and tamper, extract, or destroy data. Most breach studies show time to detect a breach is over 200 days, typically detected by external parties rather than internal processes or monitoring.

Google to Encrypt Android Cloud Backups With Your Lock Screen Password

References

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