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TECHNIQUES
PRE-ATT&CK
Priority Definition Planning
Priority Definition Direction
Target Selection
Technical Information Gathering
People Information Gathering
Organizational Information Gathering
Technical Weakness Identification
People Weakness Identification
Organizational Weakness Identification
Adversary OPSEC
Establish & Maintain Infrastructure
Persona Development
Build Capabilities
Test Capabilities
Stage Capabilities
Enterprise
Initial Access
Phishing
Supply Chain Compromise
Valid Accounts
Execution
Command and Scripting Interpreter
Inter-Process Communication
Scheduled Task/Job
System Services
User Execution
Persistence
Account Manipulation
Boot or Logon Autostart Execution
Boot or Logon Initialization Scripts
Create Account
Create or Modify System Process
Event Triggered Execution
Hijack Execution Flow
Office Application Startup
Pre-OS Boot
Scheduled Task/Job
Server Software Component
Traffic Signaling
Valid Accounts
Privilege Escalation
Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism
Access Token Manipulation
Boot or Logon Autostart Execution
Boot or Logon Initialization Scripts
Create or Modify System Process
Event Triggered Execution
Hijack Execution Flow
Process Injection
Scheduled Task/Job
Valid Accounts
Defense Evasion
Abuse Elevation Control Mechanism
Access Token Manipulation
Execution Guardrails
File and Directory Permissions Modification
Hide Artifacts
Hijack Execution Flow
Impair Defenses
Indicator Removal on Host
Masquerading
Modify Authentication Process
Modify Cloud Compute Infrastructure
Obfuscated Files or Information
Pre-OS Boot
Process Injection
Signed Binary Proxy Execution
Signed Script Proxy Execution
Subvert Trust Controls
Traffic Signaling
Trusted Developer Utilities Proxy Execution
Use Alternate Authentication Material
Valid Accounts
Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion
Credential Access
Brute Force
Credentials from Password Stores
Input Capture
Man-in-the-Middle
Modify Authentication Process
OS Credential Dumping
Steal or Forge Kerberos Tickets
Unsecured Credentials
Discovery
Account Discovery
Permission Groups Discovery
Software Discovery
Virtualization/Sandbox Evasion
Lateral Movement
Remote Service Session Hijacking
Remote Services
Use Alternate Authentication Material
Collection
Archive Collected Data
Data from Information Repositories
Data Staged
Email Collection
Input Capture
Man-in-the-Middle
Command and Control
Application Layer Protocol
Data Encoding
Data Obfuscation
Dynamic Resolution
Encrypted Channel
Proxy
Traffic Signaling
Web Service
Exfiltration
Exfiltration Over Alternative Protocol
Exfiltration Over Other Network Medium
Exfiltration Over Physical Medium
Exfiltration Over Web Service
Impact
Data Manipulation
Defacement
Disk Wipe
Endpoint Denial of Service
Network Denial of Service
Mobile
Initial Access
Execution
Persistence
Privilege Escalation
Defense Evasion
Credential Access
Discovery
Lateral Movement
Collection
Command and Control
Exfiltration
Impact
Network Effects
Remote Service Effects
  1. Home
  2. Techniques
  3. Mobile
  4. Input Injection

Input Injection

A malicious application can inject input to the user interface to mimic user interaction through the abuse of Android's accessibility APIs.

Input Injection can be achieved using any of the following methods:

  • Mimicking user clicks on the screen, for example to steal money from a user's PayPal account.[1]
  • Injecting global actions, such as GLOBAL_ACTION_BACK (programatically mimicking a physical back button press), to trigger actions on behalf of the user.[2]
  • Inserting input into text fields on behalf of the user. This method is used legitimately to auto-fill text fields by applications such as password managers.[3]
ID: T1516
Sub-techniques:  No sub-techniques
Tactic Type: Post-Adversary Device Access
Tactics: Defense Evasion, Impact
Platforms: Android
Contributors: Lukáš Štefanko, ESET
Version: 1.1
Created: 15 September 2019
Last Modified: 24 June 2020

Procedure Examples

Name Description
Cerberus

Cerberus can inject input to grant itself additional permissions without user interaction and to prevent application removal.[8][9]
DEFENSOR ID

DEFENSOR ID can abuse the accessibility service to perform actions on behalf of the user, including launching attacker-specified applications to steal data.[7]
Ginp

Ginp can inject input to make itself the default SMS handler.[6]

Gustuff

Gustuff injects the global action GLOBAL_ACTION_BACK to mimic pressing the back button to close the application if a call to an open antivirus application is detected.[2]
Riltok

Riltok injects input to set itself as the default SMS handler by clicking the appropriate places on the screen. It can also close or minimize targeted antivirus applications and the device security settings screen.[4]
TrickMo

TrickMo can inject input to set itself as the default SMS handler, and to automatically click through pop-ups without giving the user any time to react.[5]

Mitigations

Mitigation Description
Application Vetting

Applications that register an accessibility service should be scrutinized further for malicious behavior.
Enterprise Policy

An EMM/MDM can use the Android DevicePolicyManager.setPermittedAccessibilityServices method to set an explicit list of applications that are allowed to use Android's accessibility features.
User Guidance

Users should be warned against granting access to accessibility features, and to carefully scrutinize applications that request this dangerous permission.

Detection

Users can view applications that have registered accessibility services in the accessibility menu within the device settings.

References

  1. Lukáš Štefanko. (2018, December 11). Android Trojan steals money from PayPal accounts even with 2FA on. Retrieved July 11, 2019.
  2. Vitor Ventura. (2019, April 9). Gustuff banking botnet targets Australia . Retrieved September 3, 2019.
  3. Bitwarden. (n.d.). Auto-fill logins on Android . Retrieved September 15, 2019.
  4. Tatyana Shishkova. (2019, June 25). Riltok mobile Trojan: A banker with global reach. Retrieved August 7, 2019.
  5. P. Asinovsky. (2020, March 24). TrickBot Pushing a 2FA Bypass App to Bank Customers in Germany. Retrieved April 24, 2020.
  1. ThreatFabric. (2019, November). Ginp - A malware patchwork borrowing from Anubis. Retrieved April 8, 2020.
  2. L. Stefanko. (2020, May 22). Insidious Android malware gives up all malicious features but one to gain stealth. Retrieved June 26, 2020.
  3. Threat Fabric. (2019, August). Cerberus - A new banking Trojan from the underworld. Retrieved June 26, 2020.
  4. A. Hazum, B. Melnykov, C. Efrati, D. Golubenko, I. Wernik, L. Kuperman, O. Mana. (2020, April 29). First seen in the wild – Malware uses Corporate MDM as attack vector. Retrieved June 26, 2020.