Facebook shrugs as Free Basics private key found to be signing unrelated apps

guest · Sep 2, 2019

Facebook shrugs as Free Basics private key found to be signing unrelated apps
Walled-garden Android platform security easily copied
September 2, 2019
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2019/09/02/facebook_basics_app_key_compromised/

Facebook has insisted that losing control of the private key used to sign its Facebook Basics app is no biggie despite totally unrelated apps from other vendors, signed with the same key, popping up in unofficial repositories.

So it was that last week the Android Police website, something between an online souk and an occasional tech blog, informed the world that "random APKs" were being uploaded to its Android app mirror site – with Facebook's key signature. The site maintains its own APK repository, parallel to the Google Play store.

"In the last month, we've spotted third-party apps using a debug signing key which matched the key used by Facebook for its Free Basics Android app," wrote Android Police.
He also claimed that because he tweeted about it publicly after reporting it, Facebook had refused to pay out a bug bounty.
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A Facebook spokesbeing told The Register: "We were notified of a potential security issue that could have tricked people into installing a malicious update to their Free Basics app for Android if they chose to use untrusted sources. We have seen no evidence of abuse and have fixed the issue in the latest release of the app."

The standard advice is not to install apps from anywhere other than the official app stores. Indeed, someone using the Google Play store wouldn't have been affected by this at all, and one would hope even Google might notice a key being recycled between app makers.
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Facebook shrugs as Free Basics private key found to be signing unrelated apps

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