Mobile User Experience Options When Screen Sharing is Not Allowed for DLP

Last updated January 14, 2024 by Appdome

Learn to Prevent App Screen Sharing in Mobile apps, in mobile CI/CD with a Data-Driven DevSecOps™ build system.

What are the Risks of App Screen Sharing?

App screen sharing involves sharing the content of a mobile device screen with other users or devices, thus allowing the other user to view all of the content on your screen.
While there are many legitimate uses for screen sharing, hackers also use screen sharing for many malicious reasons, and apps that handle sensitive data, such as banking and share-trading apps, are a prime target of data extraction attempts. Even when communication and data transfer from an app is restricted, screen sharing, screen recording, and screenshots may still be used for extracting sensitive data. Preventing these functionalities adds another layer of DLP (Data Leak Prevention).
Nevertheless, you may still want to allow users to take screenshots, recordings, or screen capture in certain areas of your app that you want the user to be able to capture.

How does Appdome Allow and Prevent Screen Sharing?

With the Appdome feature turned on, the default User experience is to send the user a notification (the “App Compromise Notification” message)  when trying to share the screen in your app (when this toggle is enabled). However, in areas and in circumstances where you do want to enable screenshots, recordings, or screen capture by enabling and implementing Threat-Events. When using Threat-Events your application will receive the event when the security event is triggered and you can implement your own rules and logic on what to do when this event is triggered.

NOTE: With Threat-Events, Appdome is no longer enforcing the security but passes the events to your app where you have to enforce the protection and notify the user as desired.

Prerequisites for Using Prevent App Screen Sharing:

To use Appdome’s mobile app security build system to Prevent App Screen Sharing , you’ll need:

Prevent App Screen Sharing on Mobile apps using Appdome

On Appdome, follow these 3 simple steps to create self-defending Mobile Apps that Prevent App Screen Sharing without an SDK or gateway:

  1. Upload the Mobile App to Appdome.

    1. Upload an app to Appdome’s Mobile App Security Build System

    2. Upload Method: Appdome Console or DEV-API
    3. Mobile App Formats: .ipa for iOS, or .apk or .aab for Android
    4. Prevent App Screen Sharing Compatible With: Obj-C, C+, Java, JS, C#, C++, Swift, Kotlin, Flutter, React Native, Unity, Xamarin, and more
  2. Build the feature: Prevent App Screen Sharing.

    1. Building Prevent App Screen Sharing by using Appdome’s DEV-API:

      1. Create and name the Fusion Set (security template) that will contain the Prevent App Screen Sharing feature as shown below:
      2. fusion set that contains Prevent App Screen Sharing

        Figure 1: Fusion Set that will contain the Prevent App Screen Sharing feature
        Note: Naming the Fusion Set to correspond to the protection(s) selected is for illustration purposes only (not required).

      3. Follow the steps in Sections 2.2.1-2.2.2 of this article, Building the Prevent App Screen Sharing feature via Appdome Console, to add the Prevent App Screen Sharing feature to this Fusion Set.

      4. Open the Fusion Set Detail Summary by clicking the “...” symbol on the far-right corner of the Fusion Set, as shown in Figure 1 above, and get the Fusion Set ID from the Fusion Set Detail Summary (as shown below): fusion Set Detail Summary image

        Figure 2: Fusion Set Detail Summary
        Note: Annotating the Fusion Set to identify the protection(s) selected is optional only (not mandatory).

      5. Follow the instructions below to use the Fusion Set ID inside any standard mobile DevOps or CI/CD toolkit like Bitrise, App Center, Jenkins, Travis, Team City, Cirlce CI or other system:
        1. Build an API for the app – for instructions, see the tasks under Appdome API Reference Guide
        2. Look for sample APIs in Appdome’s GitHub Repository
    2. Building the Prevent App Screen Sharing feature via Appdome Console

      To build the Prevent App Screen Sharing protection by using Appdome Console, follow the instructions below.

      1. Where: Inside the Appdome Console, go to Build > Security Tab > Mobile Privacy section.
      2. When you select the Prevent App Screen Sharing you'll notice that your Fusion Set you created in step 2.1.1 now bears the icon of the protection category that contains Prevent App Screen Sharing

        Fusion Set applied Prevent App Screen Sharing

        Figure 4: Fusion Set that displays the newly added Prevent App Screen Sharing protection

      3. Select the Threat-Event™ in-app mobile Threat Defense and Intelligence policy for Prevent App Screen Sharing:
        1. Threat-Events™ OFF > In-App Defense

          If the Threat-Events™ setting is cleared (not selected). Appdome will detect and defend the user and app by enforcing Prevent App Screen Sharing.

        2. Threat-Events™ ON > In-App Detection

          When this setting is used, Appdome detects when your application is being shared or mirrored and passes Appdome’s Threat-Event™ attack intelligence to the app’s business logic for processing, enforcement, and user notification. For more information on consuming and using Appdome Threat-Events™ in the app, see section Using Threat-Events™ for Prevent App Screen Sharing Intelligence and Control in Mobile Apps.

        3. Threat-Events™ ON > In-App Defense

          When this setting is used, Appdome detects and defends against App Screen Sharing (same as Appdome Enforce) and passes Appdome’s Threat-Event™ attack intelligence the app’s business logic for processing. For more information on consuming and using Appdome Threat-Events™ in the app, see section Using Threat-Events™ for Prevent App Screen Sharing Intelligence and Control in Mobile Apps.

      4. Extra Configuration with Prevent App Screen Sharing:
        1. Android only - Protect Dynamically Generated Windows

          Extends App Screen Sharing Prevention to all Android floating windows.

      5. Click Build My App at the bottom of the Build Workflow (shown in Figure 3).
    Congratulations!  The Prevent App Screen Sharing protection is now added to the mobile app

Using Threat-Events™ for App Screen Sharing Intelligence and Control in Mobile Apps

Appdome Threat-Events™ provides consumable in-app mobile app attack intelligence and defense control when App Screen Sharing is detected. To consume and use Threat-Events™ for App Screen Sharing in Mobile Apps, use AddObserverForName in Notification Center, and the code samples for Threat-Events™ for App Screen Sharing shown below.

The specifications and options for Threat-Events™ for App Screen Sharing are:

Threat-Event™ Elements Prevent App Screen Sharing Method Detail
Appdome Feature Name Prevent App Screen Sharing
Threat-Event Mode
OFF, IN-APP DEFENSE Appdome detects, defends and notifies user (standard OS dialog) using customizable messaging.
ON, IN-APP DETECTION Appdome detects the attack or threat and passes the event in a standard format to the app for processing (app chooses how and when to enforce).
ON, IN-APP DEFENSE Uses Appdome Enforce mode for any attack or threat and passes the event in a standard format to the app for processing (gather intel on attacks and threats without losing any protection).
Certified Secure™ Threat Event Check
Visible in ThreatScope™
Developer Parameters for Preventing App Screen Sharing Threat-Event™
Threat-Event NAME BlockedScreenCaptureEvent
Threat-Event DATA reasonData
Threat-Event CODE reasonCode
Threat-Event REF 6802
Threat-Event SCORE
currentThreatEventScore Current Threat-Event score
threatEventsScore Total Threat-events score
Threat-Event Context Keys
message Message displayed for the user on event
externalID The external ID of the event which can be listened via Threat Events
osVersion OS version of the current device
deviceModel Current device model
deviceManufacturer The manufacturer of the current device
fusedAppToken The task ID of the Appdome fusion of the currently running app
kernelInfo Info about the kernel: system name, node name, release, version and machine.
carrierPlmn PLMN of the device
deviceID Current device ID
reasonCode Reason code of the occured event
buildDate Appdome fusion date of the current application
devicePlatform OS name of the current device
carrierName Carrier name of the current device
updatedOSVersion Is the OS version up to date
deviceBrand Brand of the device
deviceBoard Board of the device
buildUser Build user
buildHost Build host
sdkVersion Sdk version
timeZone Time zone
deviceFaceDown Is the device face down
locationLong Location long
locationLat Location lat
locationState Location state
wifiSsid Wifi SSID
wifiSsidPermissionStatus Wifi SSID permission status
context Context of the security event

With Threat-Events™ enabled (turned ON), Mobile developers can get detailed attack intelligence and granular defense control in Mobile applications and create amazing user experiences for all mobile end users when App Screen Sharing is detected.

The following is a code sample for native Mobile apps, which uses all values in the specification above for Prevent App Screen Sharing:


Using Appdome, there are no development or coding prerequisites to build secured Mobile Apps by using Prevent App Screen Sharing. There is no SDK and no library to code or implement in the app and no gateway to deploy in your network. All protections are built into each app and the resulting app is self-defending and self-protecting.

Releasing and Publishing Mobile Apps with Prevent App Screen Sharing

After successfully securing your app by using Appdome, there are several available options to complete your project, depending on your app lifecycle or workflow. These include:

Related Articles:

If you have any questions, please send them our way at support.appdome.com or via the chat window on the Appdome platform.

Thank you!

Thanks for visiting Appdome! Our mission is to secure every app on the planet by making mobile app security easy. We hope we’re living up to the mission with your project.

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