An observational investigation of reverse engineers' processes

Daniel Votipka, Seth M. Rabin, Kristopher Micinski, Jeffrey S. Foster, Michelle M. Mazurek

Research output: Chapter in Book/Entry/PoemConference contribution

49 Scopus citations

Abstract

Reverse engineering is a complex process essential to software-security tasks such as vulnerability discovery and malware analysis. Significant research and engineering effort has gone into developing tools to support reverse engineers. However, little work has been done to understand the way reverse engineers think when analyzing programs, leaving tool developers to make interface design decisions based only on intuition. This paper takes a first step toward a better understanding of reverse engineers' processes, with the goal of producing insights for improving interaction design for reverse engineering tools. We present the results of a semi-structured, observational interview study of reverse engineers (N=16). Each observation investigated the questions reverse engineers ask as they probe a program, how they answer these questions, and the decisions they make throughout the reverse engineering process. From the interview responses, we distill a model of the reverse engineering process, divided into three phases: overview, sub-component scanning, and focused experimentation. Each analysis phase's results feed the next as reverse engineers' mental representations become more concrete. We find that reverse engineers typically use static methods in the first two phases, but dynamic methods in the final phase, with experience playing large, but varying, roles in each phase. Based on these results, we provide five interaction design guidelines for reverse engineering tools.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationProceedings of the 29th USENIX Security Symposium
PublisherUSENIX Association
Pages1875-1892
Number of pages18
ISBN (Electronic)9781939133175
StatePublished - 2020
Event29th USENIX Security Symposium - Virtual, Online
Duration: Aug 12 2020Aug 14 2020

Publication series

NameProceedings of the 29th USENIX Security Symposium

Conference

Conference29th USENIX Security Symposium
CityVirtual, Online
Period8/12/208/14/20

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Computer Networks and Communications
  • Information Systems
  • Safety, Risk, Reliability and Quality

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