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Android

Barclays Mobile Banking on Rooted Android

Karl Stoney

• 1 min read

Barclays mobile banking does a whole host of checks to ensure that you're not running the app on a rooted android device. This is very annoying for the vast majority of android power users!

I've been messing around for ages, trawling forums, trying to get it working and finally I have, and wanted to share how it is done.

This is tested on my phone which is CM10.1 Android 4.2.2 on Samsung Galaxy S3 (I9300).

The Solution

Follow these steps

  1. Download a root file explorer and editor from the market. Something like ES File Explorer or Root Explorer is fine.
  2. Navigate to /system and mount it as R/W
  3. Open build.prop for editing
  4. Remove the two lines:
    ro.cm.version=
    ro.modversion=
  5. Change the following line:
    ro.build.tags=test-keys
    to
    ro.build.tags=release-keys
  6. Download SuperSU from the Play Store, run it and accept the binary update if you need one
  7. Go to the setting tab and do "Full unroot", and then reboot your device
  8. When your device comes back to life you're completely un-rooted, download and install Barclays mobile banking app, register as normal :-)
  9. Now to get your SU back, download this file and flash it in ClockWorkMod Recovery http://puu.sh/372bd.zip
  10. Re-download SuperSU and do the binary update but do not do anything else (ie move to the system directory)
  11. You should still be able to load Barclays banking, and have a rooted phone!

I understand why Barclays want to protect their customers, but they're alienating a large number of Android power users.