Gemini: A Lightweight Virtualization Architecture for Protecting Privacy and Security of Smartphone

Abstract

With the smartphone becoming more and more ubiquitous, the problem of security and privacy has attracted considerable attention. In order to protect private information many users carry multiple phones to accommodate work, personal, and geographic mobility needs. We present Gemini, lightweight virtualization architecture for enabling multiple virtual smartphones to run simultaneously on the same physical cellphone in an isolated, separated manner. Gemini introduces a usage model of having one foreground virtual phone and multiple background virtual phones. This paper presents a new device virtualization mechanism and novel device proxy. They integrate with lightweight virtualization of operating system to multiplex phone hardware. The virtual display architecture is also proposed in this paper, which is used to switch between Virtual Phones (VPs) quickly without shutting screen down. Gemini virtual phone features include fully accelerated 3D graphics, complete power management features, full telephony functionality with separately assignable telephone numbers and address books and caller ID support, and complete Wi-Fi, sensor, camera and other devices functionality. We have implemented a prototype of Gemini that supports multiple virtual phones on the same smartphone. Our performance results demonstrate that Gemini imposes only modest runtime and memory overhead, works seamlessly across multiple hardware devices including LG Galaxy 4 and ZTE Z7 phones, and transparently runs Android applications at native speed without any modifications.