Study on content rating and security permissions of mobile applications in google play

Abstract

This paper shares the results of a study on content rating and security permissions of mobile applications used by the online platform Google Play. Many questions are now raised regarding the age suitability and content for all mobile applications designed for children. More than that, do the users know the security issues they are exposed to when installing a specific application? We undertook a survey with children and teens to obtain information about the knowledge of the content rating and permissions of applications. This study also collected information directly from the market place using an application developed by authors. The information obtained was used to analyze the importance of content rating and security permissions in mobile games and their impact on children. As a final step, we correlated both the data obtained from surveys with the data provided by our application.