Re: Obfuscators

From:
Daniel Pitts <newsgroup.spamfilter@virtualinfinity.net>
Newsgroups:
comp.lang.java.programmer
Date:
Tue, 16 Sep 2008 13:30:36 -0700
Message-ID:
<48D0176C.6070108@virtualinfinity.net>
Silvio Bierman wrote:

carmelo wrote:

On 16 Set, 17:26, Daniel Pitts
<newsgroup.spamfil...@virtualinfinity.net> wrote:

The *best* protection is copyright and a EULA.
There are plenty of existing threads on this newsgroup about
obfuscation, I suggest you do a Google search.

HTH,
Daniel.
--
Daniel Pitts' Tech Blog: <http://virtualinfinity.net/wordpress/>


Ok, but there is no method for making the reverse engineering of your
java code hard? I thought that a good obfuscator should do that...
Is there any way to protect a java code against who wants to crack it?


That depends on what you want to protect. If it is the secret password
that protects your family jewels I would not count on obfuscation. If
you are shipping an application and you want to prevent people from
decompiling it to working and compilable Java code they can work with
themselves a good obfuscator can go a long way.

In contrast to what many people (want to make you) believe a smart
obfuscator can prevent current decompilers from generating compilable
Java code. It can do this by generating Java-source-invalid
class/method/variable names and reordering code in such a way that
current decompilers can not reproduce the correct Java construct
(for/while/if etc) that was used. I have seen most of them resort to
non-Java output containing named labels and goto instructions which are
of course part of the VM instruction set but not of the Java language.

Silvio

That doesn't mean that the code can't be reverse engineered, only that
it is more difficult. There may be no out-of-the-box reverse obfuscation
programs, but they could be written, or it could be done by hand.
Obfuscation is like a chain-link fence. It'll keep the rabble out, but
not a determined trespasser.

--
Daniel Pitts' Tech Blog: <http://virtualinfinity.net/wordpress/>

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