{"id":{"repo_id":"sask","oai_identifier":"oai:harvest.usask.ca:10388/17995"},"canonical_url":"https://search.dev.ndltd.org/etd/sask/oai:harvest.usask.ca:10388/17995","repository":{"repo_id":"sask","name":"University of Saskatchewan","base_url":"https://harvest.usask.ca/server/oai/request"},"display":{"title":"Security Implications of Reflection across the Android Ecosystem","abstract":"As Android continues to evolve into a general-purpose operating system beyond smartphones, reflection provides adversaries with a practical mechanism to evade modern API restrictions and undermine defenses that rely on static linkage. In this thesis, we show that, despite the mitigation measures introduced by Google, reflection remains a persistent and systemic threat across the Android ecosystem. We position reflection as the central exploitation mechanism and demonstrate how both traditional and novel attacks can be executed using reflection as a gateway. In this work, we implement three representative attacks: an Audio Service attack, an Intent Storm attack, and a Launcher attack. We evaluate them across Android Studio emulator images (mobile, TV, Wear OS, and AAOS/OEM) and multiple physical devices spanning API levels 30–36. The resulting behaviours include service disruption and sustained system server load, with emulator instances often requiring cold boot recovery and physical devices exhibiting auto reboot along with noticeable thermal spikes. Our findings highlight that reflection enables adaptable, version-resilient exploitation patterns that amplify impact through concurrency and runtime discovery, motivating the need for stronger policy enforcement and monitoring of reflective access paths and high frequency system-service interactions across Android form factors.","abstract_html":"As Android continues to evolve into a general-purpose operating system beyond smartphones, reflection provides adversaries with a practical mechanism to evade modern API restrictions and undermine defenses that rely on static linkage. In this thesis, we show that, despite the mitigation measures introduced by Google, reflection remains a persistent and systemic threat across the Android ecosystem. We position reflection as the central exploitation mechanism and demonstrate how both traditional and novel attacks can be executed using reflection as a gateway. In this work, we implement three representative attacks: an Audio Service attack, an Intent Storm attack, and a Launcher attack. We evaluate them across Android Studio emulator images (mobile, TV, Wear OS, and AAOS/OEM) and multiple physical devices spanning API levels 30–36. The resulting behaviours include service disruption and sustained system server load, with emulator instances often requiring cold boot recovery and physical devices exhibiting auto reboot along with noticeable thermal spikes. Our findings highlight that reflection enables adaptable, version-resilient exploitation patterns that amplify impact through concurrency and runtime discovery, motivating the need for stronger policy enforcement and monitoring of reflective access paths and high frequency system-service interactions across Android form factors.","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Khan, Faiyaz"],"institution":"University of Saskatchewan","degree_name":"Master of Science (M.Sc.)","degree_level":"Masters","degree_discipline":"Computer Science","degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":[],"advisors":["Stakhanova, Natalia"],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":["Dutchyn, Christopher","Eager, Derek"],"year":2026,"date_issued":"2026-02-23","date_published":"2026-02-23","updated_at":"2026-07-24T04:26:59Z","subjects":["Android Security, Java Reflection, Reflection-based Attacks"],"languages":["en"],"rights":[],"rights_urls":[],"identifier_entries":[]},"links":{"outbound_url":"https://hdl.handle.net/10388/17995","outbound_label":"Handle","outbound_source":"dc:identifier.uri"},"metadata_groups":[{"id":"people","label":"People","entries":[{"key":"dc:contributor.advisor","label":"Advisor","values":["Stakhanova, Natalia"]},{"key":"dc:contributor.committeemember","label":"Committee Member","values":["Dutchyn, Christopher","Eager, Derek"]},{"key":"dc:creator","label":"Author","values":["Khan, Faiyaz"]}]},{"id":"academic_context","label":"Academic Context","entries":[{"key":"dc:date.accessioned","label":"Dc Date Accessioned","values":["2026-02-23T20:07:16Z"]},{"key":"dc:date.issued","label":"Date","values":["2026-02-23"]},{"key":"dc:type","label":"Dc Type","values":["Thesis"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_discipline","label":"Discipline","values":["Computer Science"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_level","label":"Degree Level","values":["Masters"]},{"key":"thesis:degree_name","label":"Degree Name","values":["Master of Science (M.Sc.)"]},{"key":"thesis:institution_name","label":"Thesis Institution Name","values":["University of Saskatchewan"]}]},{"id":"subjects_keywords","label":"Subjects and Keywords","entries":[{"key":"dc:subject","label":"Dc Subject","values":["Android Security, Java Reflection, Reflection-based Attacks"]}]},{"id":"language_rights","label":"Language and Rights","entries":[{"key":"dc:language.iso","label":"Language (ISO)","values":["en"]}]},{"id":"identifiers","label":"Identifiers","entries":[{"key":"dc:identifier.uri","label":"Identifier URI","values":["https://hdl.handle.net/10388/17995"]}]},{"id":"additional","label":"Additional Metadata","entries":[{"key":"dc:description.abstract","label":"Abstract","values":["As Android continues to evolve into a general-purpose operating system beyond smartphones, reflection provides adversaries with a practical mechanism to evade modern API restrictions and undermine defenses that rely on static linkage. In this thesis, we show that, despite the mitigation measures introduced by Google, reflection remains a persistent and systemic threat across the Android ecosystem. We position reflection as the central exploitation mechanism and demonstrate how both traditional and novel attacks can be executed using reflection as a gateway. In this work, we implement three representative attacks: an Audio Service attack, an Intent Storm attack, and a Launcher attack. We evaluate them across Android Studio emulator images (mobile, TV, Wear OS, and AAOS/OEM) and multiple physical devices spanning API levels 30–36. The resulting behaviours include service disruption and sustained system server load, with emulator instances often requiring cold boot recovery and physical devices exhibiting auto reboot along with noticeable thermal spikes. Our findings highlight that reflection enables adaptable, version-resilient exploitation patterns that amplify impact through concurrency and runtime discovery, motivating the need for stronger policy enforcement and monitoring of reflective access paths and high frequency system-service interactions across Android form factors."]},{"key":"dc:format.mimetype","label":"Dc Format Mimetype","values":["application/pdf"]},{"key":"dc:title","label":"Title","values":["Security Implications of Reflection across the Android Ecosystem"]}]}],"canonical_facts":{"dc:contributor.advisor":["Stakhanova, Natalia"],"dc:contributor.committeemember":["Dutchyn, Christopher","Eager, Derek"],"dc:creator":["Khan, Faiyaz"],"dc:date.accessioned":["2026-02-23T20:07:16Z"],"dc:date.issued":["2026-02-23"],"dc:description.abstract":["As Android continues to evolve into a general-purpose operating system beyond smartphones, reflection provides adversaries with a practical mechanism to evade modern API restrictions and undermine defenses that rely on static linkage. In this thesis, we show that, despite the mitigation measures introduced by Google, reflection remains a persistent and systemic threat across the Android ecosystem. We position reflection as the central exploitation mechanism and demonstrate how both traditional and novel attacks can be executed using reflection as a gateway. In this work, we implement three representative attacks: an Audio Service attack, an Intent Storm attack, and a Launcher attack. We evaluate them across Android Studio emulator images (mobile, TV, Wear OS, and AAOS/OEM) and multiple physical devices spanning API levels 30–36. The resulting behaviours include service disruption and sustained system server load, with emulator instances often requiring cold boot recovery and physical devices exhibiting auto reboot along with noticeable thermal spikes. Our findings highlight that reflection enables adaptable, version-resilient exploitation patterns that amplify impact through concurrency and runtime discovery, motivating the need for stronger policy enforcement and monitoring of reflective access paths and high frequency system-service interactions across Android form factors."],"dc:format.mimetype":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier.uri":["https://hdl.handle.net/10388/17995"],"dc:language.iso":["en"],"dc:subject":["Android Security, Java Reflection, Reflection-based Attacks"],"dc:title":["Security Implications of Reflection across the Android Ecosystem"],"dc:type":["Thesis"],"thesis:degree_discipline":["Computer Science"],"thesis:degree_level":["Masters"],"thesis:degree_name":["Master of Science (M.Sc.)"],"thesis:institution_name":["University of Saskatchewan"]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T04:26:59Z"}