Specifications

Attack Surface Analysis of BlackBerry Devices
Auto start-up and Background processes
Signed applications can start themselves automatically whenever the system is started via compile time
settings. The developer simply designates the application as a “System Module” that should “Auto-run on
startup” in the project properties (see Figure
9). This also has the effect of not displaying
the application in the standard ribbon.
Once an application is started, the applica-
tion can also set itself to continue running in
the background via a documented run-time
API (
Application.requestBackground()).
This API can be used by both signed and
unsigned applications.
SMS (Short Message Service)
Since the BlackBerry implements the MIDP2
6
standard, sending and receiving SMS mes-
sages is very simple, and doesn't require the
code to be signed. In a default BIS configura-
tion (with the firewall turned off) the user
will receive a standard MIDP prompt the first
time the application attempts to send a mes-
sage, asking if they wish to allow network
access. There are no further warnings on
subsequent runs of the application.
Furthermore, the same warning is used for an
application making a HTTP connection or try-
ing to send an SMS. So a user could be easily
fooled into sending very expensive premium
SMS messages by an application that pur-
ports to connect to the Web for legitimate
purposes.
Premium Rate Scam
Regular PC users are often targeted by premium rate "dialers", applications which connect the user's
modem to a premium rate telephone number, running up large than expected service provider bills in the
process. A similar technique could be employed on the BlackBerry, but instead using premium rate SMS
numbers. The application would work as follows:
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Figure 9: Project Properties in the Java Development Environment (JDE)