CHAPTER 17
MOBILE CODE
Robert Gezelter
17.1.1 Mobile Code from the World Wide Web
17.1.3 Design and Implementation Errors
17.2.2 Fundamental Limitations of Signed Code
17.2.3 Specific Problems with the ActiveX Security Model
17.3 RESTRICTED OPERATING ENVIRONMENTS
17.4.1 Asymmetric, and Transitive or Derivative, Trust
17.4.2 Misappropriation and Subversion
17.4.3 Multidimensional Threat
17.4.4 Client Responsibilities
17.4.5 Server Responsibilities
17.1 INTRODUCTION.
At its most basic, mobile code is a set of instructions that are delivered to a remote computer for dynamic execution. The problems with mobile code stem from its ability to do more than just display characters on the remote display.
It is this dynamic nature of mobile code that causes policy and implementation difficulties. A blanket prohibition on mobile code is secure, but that prohibition would prevent users of the dynamic Web from performing their tasks. It is this tension between integrity and dynamism that is at the heart of the issue.
The ongoing development of computer-based devices, particularly personal digital assistants (PDAs) and mobile phones, has broadened the spectrum of devices that use mobile code, and therefore are vulnerable to related exploits. The advent of the Apple iPhone in 2007 highlighted this hazard.1
Several definitions, ...
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