How to find and play videos downloaded and (possibly encrypted) by an Android App or Windows app

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Hi All,

There is an App which features downloading their videos for offline viewing via their Android and Windows app. I was wondering where does this app saves these videos and if they are encrypted, how to decrypt and play them?
I am a programmer but I know nothing about Android/windows app development, here is what I have been able to hack so far:

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On Android
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It seems like it save videos at: /storage/emulated/0/Android/data/com.<app_name>.android.root/files/videos/<some_random_number>/encrypted/<video_file_with_no_extension>
These files have no extension, I copied them to my laptop and tried giving different popular media extensions, nothing worked so far in neither of WMP, VLC & Quicktime Player.
I tried to identify file type using TrID (as specified in this link: http://goo.gl/EU99G3) and this utility suggests its an mp3 file (while it should be a video), I changed the extension to mp3, it did not worked either.
I tried opening the file in ISO buster and several other apps. Finally while trying different things, on android system itself when I choose the option to compute checks, it display some MD5 and SHA-1 values. I am not much familiar with these terms but figured out, these files seems to be encrypted
If I try to directly open this file on Android, System starts generating Hex Dump and then file explorer crashes.
Now if these files are really the video files and are encrypted, is there a way I can decrypt them and play directly in a video player?

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On windows store App in my laptop's Windows 8.1
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I found App files are stored at:

C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\<app_name>.com.<app_name>.com_1.5.0.2_neutral_split.scale-140_<some_random_number>

C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\<app_name>.com.<app_name>.com_1.5.0.2_x64__<some_random_number>

C:\Program Files\WindowsApps\<app_name>.com.<app_name>.com_2015.924.1324.2728_neutral_~_<some_random_number>

I was able to figure out how to assign privileges to currently logged in User and gain the access to reach at these paths but couldn't make any further progress to find encrypted or non-encrypted video files in these folders at all.

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I understand that if I really just want to download the video files there is much better and easy way by directly log in to their website and use any video grabber application or extension, its as easy as that, which does works.

But my intention here is not to download videos but rather I am just curious to do ethical hack for self learning and exploring things. Just want to understand whether it is even possible to decrypt, find appropriate extension and play them directly without the app or not. And where does both Android and Windows Apps are actually storing these videos on my own device which I am unable to access/play without App.. huh well done app developers!

Any help or pointers appreciated. Thanks :)

Posted 9-Nov-15 16:00pm

AnujSethi

Updated 9-Nov-15 16:06pm

PIEBALDconsult

v2

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Richard MacCutchan · Answer 1 · 2015-11-09T22:20:00

Solution 1

Android apps can store their files in storage locations reserved for the app (internal storage), or publicly accessible folders (external storage). This is described in detail in Handling Input and Storage on Android[^]. Windows applications store files in any directory they like.

If the videos are playable by the default applications on either device then they must be in a common standard format. However, if they are played by some special app then they could be encoded, it is difficult to know how without details of the app.

Posted 9-Nov-15 22:20pm

Richard MacCutchan

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AnujSethi 11-Nov-15 19:46pm

@Richard MacCutchan: Thank you for taking time to describe the storage basics for Apps.
However, as mentioned on Android I found the path already and the encoded files as well. Lets say I am trying for the Lynda.com app. Is there a way I can find how these video files are encoded?
For Windows: I got your point that App can store files anywhere on the disk but still, is there a way somehow I can find that path? There has to be a way... I am curios to crack this!
Wondering if there is any tool available that can tell where on disk write operations are currently happening, will start the download and monitor with the tool, if anything like that available. I will do some search on it, however if you have any better suggestion, please let me know.
Thanks :)

Richard MacCutchan 12-Nov-15 3:01am

I have no idea what Lynda.com is or how it may encode its files. As for Windows, you would need to check the settings for the individual application to find out where it saves its files. Also, such setttings may often be modified by the user. As to monitoring write operations, it is quite a complex issue, and unlikely to be of any use to a user.