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.NET Obfuscation

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  • A Offline
    A Offline
    Anders Molin
    wrote on last edited by
    #1

    I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

    My Photos[^]

    J M P L N 8 Replies Last reply
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    • A Anders Molin

      I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

      My Photos[^]

      J Offline
      J Offline
      Jeff Varszegi
      wrote on last edited by
      #2

      I'd obfuscate them, but in the past I've mostly just used renaming features of the obfuscators I've used. No matter what kind of genius wrote the tool, I'm a little leery of rearranging the structure of the code I already lovingly tuned for performance. You could always use ngen.exe to generate native images and redistribute those, couldn't you? I read about it a while back, but I've never used it. You'd have to compile different versions for different OSes, but how hard could it be? That'd make it ten times more work for someone to figure out what your code was doing, wouldn't it? Regards, Jeff Varszegi EEEP!  An Extensible Expression Evaluation Package

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      • J Jeff Varszegi

        I'd obfuscate them, but in the past I've mostly just used renaming features of the obfuscators I've used. No matter what kind of genius wrote the tool, I'm a little leery of rearranging the structure of the code I already lovingly tuned for performance. You could always use ngen.exe to generate native images and redistribute those, couldn't you? I read about it a while back, but I've never used it. You'd have to compile different versions for different OSes, but how hard could it be? That'd make it ten times more work for someone to figure out what your code was doing, wouldn't it? Regards, Jeff Varszegi EEEP!  An Extensible Expression Evaluation Package

        A Offline
        A Offline
        Anders Molin
        wrote on last edited by
        #3

        Jeff Varszegi wrote: No matter what kind of genius wrote the tool, I'm a little leery of rearranging the structure of the code I already lovingly tuned for performance. I know what you mean. And an obfuscated assembly will still be possible to decompile. It will be a mess to look at, but I don't see why it should be impossible to decompile it... Jeff Varszegi wrote: ou could always use ngen.exe to generate native images and redistribute those, couldn't you? I read somewhere that it was not possible and you had to provide the assembly anyway... - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

        My Photos[^]

        J 1 Reply Last reply
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        • A Anders Molin

          Jeff Varszegi wrote: No matter what kind of genius wrote the tool, I'm a little leery of rearranging the structure of the code I already lovingly tuned for performance. I know what you mean. And an obfuscated assembly will still be possible to decompile. It will be a mess to look at, but I don't see why it should be impossible to decompile it... Jeff Varszegi wrote: ou could always use ngen.exe to generate native images and redistribute those, couldn't you? I read somewhere that it was not possible and you had to provide the assembly anyway... - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

          My Photos[^]

          J Offline
          J Offline
          Jeff Varszegi
          wrote on last edited by
          #4

          You're right. MSDN says If Ngen.exe encounters any methods in an assembly that it cannot generate, it excludes them from the native image. When the runtime executes this assembly, it will revert to JIT compilation for the methods that were not included in the native image. Not only that, but the native image contains processor-specific machine code. Sorry for wasting your time on that one. Regards, Jeff Varszegi EEEP!  An Extensible Expression Evaluation Package

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          • A Anders Molin

            I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

            My Photos[^]

            M Offline
            M Offline
            Marcie Jones
            wrote on last edited by
            #5

            All of my .NET code is ASP.NET, so no, I don't obfuscate it :-D Marcie CP Blog[^]

            P 1 Reply Last reply
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            • A Anders Molin

              I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

              My Photos[^]

              P Offline
              P Offline
              peterchen
              wrote on last edited by
              #6

              I am looking for Deobfuscators for OpenSource Fortran code written by "6 crazy researchers". (Thats how the CTO labeled them). Do you think a .NET obfuscator could be used here? OK silly question - but an idea: Just write the core routines in Fortran.NET we now continue with the normal program


              Flirt harder, I'm a Coder
              mlog || Agile Programming | doxygen

              A 1 Reply Last reply
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              • A Anders Molin

                I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

                My Photos[^]

                L Offline
                L Offline
                l a u r e n
                wrote on last edited by
                #7

                see this is another thing i really dont like about .NOT you have to give ur source code away practically but i guess since .NOT is basically a giant vm scripting language that isnt really surprising :suss:


                "there is no spoon"
                biz stuff   about me

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                • P peterchen

                  I am looking for Deobfuscators for OpenSource Fortran code written by "6 crazy researchers". (Thats how the CTO labeled them). Do you think a .NET obfuscator could be used here? OK silly question - but an idea: Just write the core routines in Fortran.NET we now continue with the normal program


                  Flirt harder, I'm a Coder
                  mlog || Agile Programming | doxygen

                  A Offline
                  A Offline
                  Anders Molin
                  wrote on last edited by
                  #8

                  peterchen wrote: I am looking for Deobfuscators for OpenSource Fortran code written by "6 crazy researchers". LOL :laugh: - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

                  My Photos[^]

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                  • L l a u r e n

                    see this is another thing i really dont like about .NOT you have to give ur source code away practically but i guess since .NOT is basically a giant vm scripting language that isnt really surprising :suss:


                    "there is no spoon"
                    biz stuff   about me

                    G Offline
                    G Offline
                    Gavin Lees
                    wrote on last edited by
                    #9

                    l a u r e n wrote: .NOT :laugh::laugh::laugh::laugh:

                    1 Reply Last reply
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                    • A Anders Molin

                      I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

                      My Photos[^]

                      N Offline
                      N Offline
                      Nemanja Trifunovic
                      wrote on last edited by
                      #10

                      Doesn't work. I've talked about it with some Java guys and they say it is the same with Java. Whatever obfuscator you use, it will be still very easy to reverse-engineer your app. I guess this is one of the reasons why Java is used mainly for web applications.

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                      • N Nemanja Trifunovic

                        Doesn't work. I've talked about it with some Java guys and they say it is the same with Java. Whatever obfuscator you use, it will be still very easy to reverse-engineer your app. I guess this is one of the reasons why Java is used mainly for web applications.

                        J Offline
                        J Offline
                        Jeff Varszegi
                        wrote on last edited by
                        #11

                        It is the same in Java, but just being able to decompile something doesn't mean that you can use it. Have you ever downloaded an obfuscated Java applet and taken a look at the decompiled source? It's not worth the time to figure out what's going on; just destroying human-readable names makes the source, well, not human-readable. This won't defeat the resources of a government agency, a corporation, or even a knowledgeable motivated person. It is some measure of protection, though; no script kiddie or even intermediate-level person will be able to use the source, and nobody'll be able to use it without some effort. I think that to say Java is used mainly for web applications is sort of silly. It's not used for systems programming, but it is widely used for just about everything else. If you have a programmable cell phone, odds are you can program it easily in Java. Oh, wait-- I forgot where I am. Scratch that last statement. ;) To each his/her own. Regards, Jeff Varszegi EEEP!  An Extensible Expression Evaluation Package

                        A 1 Reply Last reply
                        0
                        • L l a u r e n

                          see this is another thing i really dont like about .NOT you have to give ur source code away practically but i guess since .NOT is basically a giant vm scripting language that isnt really surprising :suss:


                          "there is no spoon"
                          biz stuff   about me

                          R Offline
                          R Offline
                          Ryan Binns
                          wrote on last edited by
                          #12

                          I'd vote 5 a thousand times if I could

                          Ryan

                          "Punctuality is only a virtue for those who aren't smart enough to think of good excuses for being late" John Nichol "Point Of Impact"

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                          • A Anders Molin

                            I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

                            My Photos[^]

                            T Offline
                            T Offline
                            Terry ONolley
                            wrote on last edited by
                            #13

                            Could you be a little clearer please?


                            Glano perictu com sahni delorin!

                            P 1 Reply Last reply
                            0
                            • J Jeff Varszegi

                              It is the same in Java, but just being able to decompile something doesn't mean that you can use it. Have you ever downloaded an obfuscated Java applet and taken a look at the decompiled source? It's not worth the time to figure out what's going on; just destroying human-readable names makes the source, well, not human-readable. This won't defeat the resources of a government agency, a corporation, or even a knowledgeable motivated person. It is some measure of protection, though; no script kiddie or even intermediate-level person will be able to use the source, and nobody'll be able to use it without some effort. I think that to say Java is used mainly for web applications is sort of silly. It's not used for systems programming, but it is widely used for just about everything else. If you have a programmable cell phone, odds are you can program it easily in Java. Oh, wait-- I forgot where I am. Scratch that last statement. ;) To each his/her own. Regards, Jeff Varszegi EEEP!  An Extensible Expression Evaluation Package

                              A Offline
                              A Offline
                              Alvaro Mendez
                              wrote on last edited by
                              #14

                              Jeff Varszegi wrote: I think that to say Java is used mainly for web applications is sort of silly. It's not used for systems programming, but it is widely used for just about everything else. If you have a programmable cell phone, odds are you can program it easily in Java. Oh, wait-- I forgot where I am. Scratch that last statement. To each his/her own. :laugh: Yes, please be sure to use J# when referring to J**a in the future. :-) Regards, Alvaro


                              Give a man a fish, he owes you one fish. Teach a man to fish, you give up your monopoly on fisheries.

                              I 1 Reply Last reply
                              0
                              • L l a u r e n

                                see this is another thing i really dont like about .NOT you have to give ur source code away practically but i guess since .NOT is basically a giant vm scripting language that isnt really surprising :suss:


                                "there is no spoon"
                                biz stuff   about me

                                R Offline
                                R Offline
                                Rocky Moore
                                wrote on last edited by
                                #15

                                l a u r e n wrote: you have to give ur source code away practically You do that same any program, it is just the source they see is assembler ;) Rocky <>< www.HintsAndTips.com www.GotTheAnswerToSpam.com

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                                • N Nemanja Trifunovic

                                  Doesn't work. I've talked about it with some Java guys and they say it is the same with Java. Whatever obfuscator you use, it will be still very easy to reverse-engineer your app. I guess this is one of the reasons why Java is used mainly for web applications.

                                  R Offline
                                  R Offline
                                  Rocky Moore
                                  wrote on last edited by
                                  #16

                                  Nemanja Trifunovic wrote: I guess this is one of the reasons why Java is used mainly for web applications And all this time, I thought it was the ugly GUI :) Kidding aside, there actually are a lot of Java applications in use today which many people may not even know are Java. One that comes to mind that I used in the past was Source Offsite. Oh yeah, they moved to .NET and is not written in C# ;) Rocky <>< www.HintsAndTips.com www.GotTheAnswerToSpam.com

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                                  • T Terry ONolley

                                    Could you be a little clearer please?


                                    Glano perictu com sahni delorin!

                                    P Offline
                                    P Offline
                                    Paul Watson
                                    wrote on last edited by
                                    #17

                                    I'm lkoiong itno Otfbusacion of .ENT aselsmebis and is wnodrenig how mnay ppoele taht atculaly uess it... If you mkae poarmgrs unisg .NET, do you Ofbucsate yuor felis bfreoe gnviig tehm to csutoemrs? Any togthuhs aobut Oifuscatobn in ganeerl? regards, Paul Watson Bluegrass South Africa Christopher Duncan quoted: "...that would require my explaining Einstein's Fear of Relatives" Crikey! ain't life grand? Einstein says...

                                    T 1 Reply Last reply
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                                    • A Anders Molin

                                      I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

                                      My Photos[^]

                                      P Offline
                                      P Offline
                                      Paul Watson
                                      wrote on last edited by
                                      #18

                                      1. Nutters, opressed-from-on-high developers and pomegranates use it 2. No 3. It's daft. 4. But if you want to, then go right ahead. regards, Paul Watson Bluegrass South Africa Christopher Duncan quoted: "...that would require my explaining Einstein's Fear of Relatives" Crikey! ain't life grand? Einstein says...

                                      A 1 Reply Last reply
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                                      • M Marcie Jones

                                        All of my .NET code is ASP.NET, so no, I don't obfuscate it :-D Marcie CP Blog[^]

                                        P Offline
                                        P Offline
                                        Paul Watson
                                        wrote on last edited by
                                        #19

                                        As a fellow ASP.NET developer I wish I could say the same. We do a lot of dev for partner companies, not direct to the end-client and have on ocassion been asked to obfuscate our code. So far my flat out refusal to do so has worked but I am sure one day a partner will be more stubborn than I am and I will have to actually install the VS.NET obfuscator. regards, Paul Watson Bluegrass South Africa Christopher Duncan quoted: "...that would require my explaining Einstein's Fear of Relatives" Crikey! ain't life grand? Einstein says...

                                        1 Reply Last reply
                                        0
                                        • A Anders Molin

                                          I'm looking into Obfuscation of .NET assemblies and is wondering how many people that actually uses it... If you make programs using .NET, do you Obfuscate your files before giving them to customers? Any thoughts about Obfuscation in general? - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!" ShotKeeper, my Photo Album / Organizer Application[^]

                                          My Photos[^]

                                          N Offline
                                          N Offline
                                          Nish Nishant
                                          wrote on last edited by
                                          #20

                                          Hey Anders One easy way to obfuscate your code would be to get a few former-VB6 guys and ask them to write portions of your .NET assemblies. They’d write obfuscated code by default that’d beat any obfuscator’s obfuscated code. :-D Nish


                                          Now with my own blog - void Nish(char* szBlog); My MVP tips, tricks and essays web site - www.voidnish.com

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