Permissions required by App Shielding added to AndroidManifest

App Shielding will, for certain configurations and elements of the SDK, require specific permissions for the application.

This chapter describes what permissions are added by the Shielding Tool, and the background for the need for these permissions.

Check Untrusted Installers, and Check Rooting

If you enable the config option checkUntrustedInstaller and/or checkRooting and declare that Google Play granted the QUERY_ALL_PACKAGES permission, then the Shielding Tool adds the following permission to the app:

• android.permission.QUERY_ALL_PACKAGES

See QUERY_ALL_PACKAGES permission, queryAllPackagesPermission (configuration option).

Screen reader protection

This permission is used by App Shielding to query the ApplicationInfo, PackageInfo and SigningInfo for the packages that are installed. App Shielding uses that data to determine if the package has an untrusted installer.

See checkUntrustedInstaller, addTrustedInstallerSigner.

Rooting check

Rooting check: In addition, rooting check will not be determining the device’s status by checking rooting applications. Other rooting checks will of course still be executed.

See checkRooting.

Activity Guard

For applications which are using Activity Guard, the Shielding Tool will add android.permission.REORDER_TASKS to the app. This permission is added to have a control over tasks and reorder the tasks after Guard Activity is finished with its check. The reasoning behind this is that Guard Activity will always run as only one activity in its own task. Afterwards, it will bring the main task of the application to the front which will require ordering.

The permission is added automatically to the application if the check, features, or version conditions are met.

Tapjacking

For applications that target Android 12 (API level 31) or later and use the checkTapjacking and blockTapjacking options, the Shielding Tool adds android.permission.HIDE_OVERLAY_WINDOWS to the app. This permission allows App Shielding to block and remove non-system overlays when the protected app is running. Doing so prevents tapjacking attacks.