[HN Gopher] APKLab: Android Reverse-Engineering Workbench for VS...
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       APKLab: Android Reverse-Engineering Workbench for VS Code
        
       Author : nateb2022
       Score  : 147 points
       Date   : 2025-07-13 21:08 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (github.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (github.com)
        
       | anakaine wrote:
       | This looks excellent. Im very curious about the MITM component -
       | it might be quite useful to highlight things / APIs apps are
       | connecting to.
        
         | nsteel wrote:
         | If you just want to see domains being connected to, then I
         | believe most android firewall applications provide that
         | functionality. Generally much easier to setup that MITM in
         | Android.
        
         | georgemcbay wrote:
         | Its always been pretty easy to insert a network configuration
         | file into an app apk's Manifest to get it to support user
         | installed certificates so you can route ssl connections through
         | an ssl proxy.
         | 
         | Its actually kind of annoying that it isn't just an OS feature
         | (hidden behind a scary settings option that's also hidden
         | behind being in developer mode) to enable user installed certs
         | for any installed application. Much less annoying to debug
         | network issues on iOS because of this and Android isn't really
         | any more secure for it.
        
         | MrDresden wrote:
         | In case mitmproxy[0] is unknown to you, I would recommend
         | giving it a look if this is something you are interested in.
         | 
         | [0] https://mitmproxy.org/
        
           | buildfocus wrote:
           | https://httptoolkit.com also worth a look if you're
           | interested in this space: has some neat automated setup for
           | Android MITM that can be much simpler _and_ more effective
           | than the manual config route (with automated Frida setup on
           | rooted devices, so it handles unpinning too!). More UI & less
           | CLI focused, so depends which way your preferences go there.
        
       | brianhama wrote:
       | This project hasn't been updated in quite some time. Does anyone
       | know if there's a more active fork or something that's replaced
       | this?
        
         | flexagoon wrote:
         | No fork, but APKLab is basically just a front end for a few
         | other tools that are being updated
        
       | wiseowise wrote:
       | Extremely ironic that there's a plugin like that for VSCode, but
       | not for Android Studio.
        
         | bradyriddle wrote:
         | Eh, I can see how this isn't exactly the kind of functionality
         | that Google wants in Android Studio.
        
           | deepsun wrote:
           | Well, no one prevents to develop and distribute plugins for
           | IntelliJ, there's even Plugin DevKit. I bet Jetbrains would
           | welcome it. Not sure Google could do anything there.
        
       | tamperoff wrote:
       | 14 year old me would love this, making custom roms on xda.
        
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       (page generated 2025-07-14 23:02 UTC)