"Your Doctor is Spying on You": An Analysis of Data Practices in Mobile Healthcare Applications
Fuente:
arXiv
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| Autori principali: | , |
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| Natura: | Preprint |
| Pubblicazione: |
2025
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| _version_ | 1866909971550044160 |
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| author | Stevenson, Luke Das, Sanchari |
| author_facet | Stevenson, Luke Das, Sanchari |
| contents | Mobile healthcare (mHealth) applications promise convenient, continuous patient-provider interaction but also introduce severe and often underexamined security and privacy risks. We present an end-to-end audit of 272 Android mHealth apps from Google Play, combining permission forensics, static vulnerability analysis, and user review mining. Our multi-tool assessment with MobSF, RiskInDroid, and OWASP Mobile Audit revealed systemic weaknesses: 26.1% request fine-grained location without disclosure, 18.3% initiate calls silently, and 73 send SMS without notice. Nearly half (49.3%) still use deprecated SHA-1 encryption, 42 transmit unencrypted data, and 6 remain vulnerable to StrandHogg 2.0. Analysis of 2.56 million user reviews found 28.5% negative or neutral sentiment, with over 553,000 explicitly citing privacy intrusions, data misuse, or operational instability. These findings demonstrate the urgent need for enforceable permission transparency, automated pre-market security vetting, and systematic adoption of secure-by-design practices to protect Protected Health Information (PHI). |
| format | Preprint |
| id |
arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2510_06015 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | "Your Doctor is Spying on You": An Analysis of Data Practices in Mobile Healthcare Applications Stevenson, Luke Das, Sanchari Cryptography and Security Computers and Society Human-Computer Interaction Mobile healthcare (mHealth) applications promise convenient, continuous patient-provider interaction but also introduce severe and often underexamined security and privacy risks. We present an end-to-end audit of 272 Android mHealth apps from Google Play, combining permission forensics, static vulnerability analysis, and user review mining. Our multi-tool assessment with MobSF, RiskInDroid, and OWASP Mobile Audit revealed systemic weaknesses: 26.1% request fine-grained location without disclosure, 18.3% initiate calls silently, and 73 send SMS without notice. Nearly half (49.3%) still use deprecated SHA-1 encryption, 42 transmit unencrypted data, and 6 remain vulnerable to StrandHogg 2.0. Analysis of 2.56 million user reviews found 28.5% negative or neutral sentiment, with over 553,000 explicitly citing privacy intrusions, data misuse, or operational instability. These findings demonstrate the urgent need for enforceable permission transparency, automated pre-market security vetting, and systematic adoption of secure-by-design practices to protect Protected Health Information (PHI). |
| title | "Your Doctor is Spying on You": An Analysis of Data Practices in Mobile Healthcare Applications |
| topic | Cryptography and Security Computers and Society Human-Computer Interaction |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.06015 |