Forensic Analysis of Android Steganography Apps

Thumbnail Image
Date
2018-08-30
Authors
Chen, Wenhao
Wang, Yangxiao
Guan, Yong
Newman, Jennifer
Lin, Li
Reinder, Stephanie
Major Professor
Advisor
Committee Member
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract

The processing power of smartphones supports steganographic algorithms that were considered to be too computationally intensive for handheld devices. Several steganography apps are now available on mobile phones to support covert communications using digital photographs.

This chapter focuses on two key questions: How effectively can a steganography app be reverse engineered? How can this knowledge help improve the detection of steganographic images and other related files? Two Android steganography apps, PixelKnot and Da Vinci Secret Image, are analyzed. Experiments demonstrate that they are constructed in very different ways and provide different levels of security for hiding messages. The results of detecting steganography files, including images generated by the apps, using three software packages are presented. The results point to an urgent need for further research on reverse engineering steganography apps and detecting images produced by these apps.

Series Number
Journal Issue
Is Version Of
Versions
Series
Type
article
Comments

This is an accepted manuscript of a chapter published as Chen, Wenhao, Yangxiao Wang, Yong Guan, Jennifer Newman, Li Lin, and Stephanie Reinders. "Forensic analysis of android steganography apps." In IFIP International Conference on Digital Forensics, pp. 293-312. Springer, Cham, 2018. Posted with permission of CSAFE.

Rights Statement
Copyright
Mon Jan 01 00:00:00 UTC 2018
Funding
DOI
Supplemental Resources
Collections