How to Securely Store User Tokens in Android Without Exposing Data

Most Android apps need to keep users logged in between sessions, which means storing authentication tokens locally. But here’s the thing, saving those tokens the wrong way can leave your app wide open to data leaks or security breaches. You can’t just toss them into plain SharedPreferences and call it a day. So how do you store them safely without compromising usability? Let’s walk through it.

Challenge:

How do you securely store and retrieve user tokens between app launches?

Solution:

Use EncryptedSharedPreferences to encrypt keys and values on disk.

kotlin
val prefs = EncryptedSharedPreferences.create( "secret_prefs", masterKeyAlias, context, EncryptedSharedPreferences.PrefKeyEncryptionScheme.AES256_SIV, EncryptedSharedPreferences.PrefValueEncryptionScheme.AES256_GCM
)
prefs.edit().putString("token", token).apply()

Conclusion:

Security shouldn’t be an afterthought. If you want your session handling to be airtight, this is one of those things best to hire Android app developers who understand secure data storage inside out.