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Table Of Contents

Binary Analysis Cookbook

By : Born

5 (1)

Buy this Book

Binary Analysis Cookbook

5 (1)

By: Born

Buy this Book

Overview of this book

Binary analysis is the process of examining a binary program to determine information security actions. It is a complex, constantly evolving, and challenging topic that crosses over into several domains of information technology and security. This binary analysis book is designed to help you get started with the basics, before gradually advancing to challenging topics. Using a recipe-based approach, this book guides you through building a lab of virtual machines and installing tools to analyze binaries effectively. You'll begin by learning about the IA32 and ELF32 as well as IA64 and ELF64 specifications. The book will then guide you in developing a methodology and exploring a variety of tools for Linux binary analysis. As you advance, you'll learn how to analyze malicious 32-bit and 64-bit binaries and identify vulnerabilities. You'll even examine obfuscation and anti-analysis techniques, analyze polymorphed malicious binaries, and get a high-level overview of dynamic taint analysis and binary instrumentation concepts. By the end of the book, you'll have gained comprehensive insights into binary analysis concepts and have developed the foundational skills to confidently delve into the realm of binary analysis.

Preface

Who this book is for

What this book covers

To get the most out of this book

Sections

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Free Chapter

Setting Up the Lab

Installing VirtualBox on Windows

Installing VirtualBox on Mac

Installing VirtualBox on Ubuntu

Installing a 32-bit Ubuntu 16.04 LTS Desktop virtual machine

Installing a 64-bit Ubuntu 16.04 LTS Desktop virtual machine

Installing the dependencies and the tools

Installing the code examples

Installing the EDB Debugger

Taking a snapshot of the virtual machines

32-bit Assembly on Linux and the ELF Specification

Technical requirements

Differences between Intel and AT&T syntax

Introduction to the IA-32 registers

Introducing common IA-32 instructions

Making IA-32 system calls on Linux

Introducing the ELF 32-bit specification

64-bit Assembly on Linux and the ELF Specification

Technical requirements

Introducing the IA64 registers

Introducing common IA64 instructions

Making IA64 system calls on Linux

Introducing the ELF 64-bit specification

Creating a Binary Analysis Methodology

Technical requirements

Performing binary discovery

Information gathering

Static analysis

Dynamic analysis

Iterating each step

Automating methodology tasks

Adapting the methodology steps

Linux Tools for Binary Analysis

Technical requirements

Using file

Using strings

Using readelf

Using nm

Using objcopy

Using objdump

Using ltrace and strace

Using data duplicator (dd)

Using the GNU Debugger (GDB)

Using Evan's Debugger (EDB)

Analyzing a Simple Bind Shell

Technical requirements

Performing discovery

Gathering information

Performing static analysis

Using ltrace and strace

Using GDB for dynamic analysis

Finishing dynamic analysis

Analyzing a Simple Reverse Shell

Technical requirements

Automating the initial phases

Static analysis with objdump

Editing the binary

Using GDB TUI mode

Continuing with dynamic analysis

Analyzing the execve system call

Identifying Vulnerabilities

Technical requirements

Automating the initial phases

Extended static analysis

Identifying hard coded credentials with ltrace

Identifying hard coded credentials with a debugger

Validating a stack-based buffer overflow

Understanding Anti-Analysis Techniques

Technical requirements

Understanding signature detection

Changing a binary's signature

Confusing static analysis tools

Encoding and decoding

A Simple Reverse Shell With Polymorphism

Technical requirements

Automating the initial phases

Performing static analysis

Using EDB for dynamic analysis

Analyzing deobfuscation loops

Wrapping up dynamic analysis

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Performing binary discovery

One of the important aspects of binary analysis is the ability to discover unknown binaries on a system, or to discover when a known binary has been replaced with one using the same name. There are a plethora of methods we could use, some open source, others commercial, but since the scope of this book is to focus on the tools freely available to us, we will embrace the power of the Linux Terminal. Everything in this recipe will work on both the 32-bit Ubuntu virtual machine and the 64-bit Ubuntu virtual machine we created in Chapter 1, Setting Up the Lab. Feel free to use either virtual machine to complete this recipe and future recipes in this chapter.

In this recipe, we will employ the following tools to perform binary discovery on our systems. I want to reiterate that this is by no means a complete list. We will cover all of these tools in depth...

Tech Concepts

Programming languages

Tech Tools