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Reverse engineering software is completely different from penetration testing, and it is the reverse engineering bit that Oracle has an issue with. They mostly

by jaawn 11y ago

Reverse engineering software is completely different from penetration testing, and it is the reverse engineering bit that Oracle has an issue with. They mostly just don't want anyone/everyone trying to recreate their source code because of copyright/intellectual property concerns (note: I do not agree with those, but that is Oracle's stance). It doesn't make sense for it to be illegal to forbid reverse engineering in a license agreement, where is that the case? If that is the legal environment anywhere, it would make more sense to just forbid closed source software. It would save a ton of time and effort and achieve the same goal. And by the way, it has everything to do with open source. If the code was open, you wouldn't need to reverse engineer it. Every security analyst could just review the code directly and search for vulnerabilities. The whole disagreement stems from Oracle (and the author) deciding that they want protected, closed source because they view it as intellectual property, while some of their customers feel they can't depend on that software unless they verify it themselves. Well...you can't fully verify closed source software yourself. It is really a very simple and fundamental disagreement on this one topic that creates the whole issue. It is completely valid to disagree with Oracle on this, and to tell Oracle you disagree with them. However, rather than violating their agreement, it would make more sense to decide to use an open source solution instead.

sklogic 11y ago
> Reverse engineering software is completely different from penetration testing How is it so? You cannot find funny vulnerabilities without reverse engineering the binaries. > It doesn't make sense for it to be illegal to forbid reverse engineering in a license agreement, where is that the case? France, Switzerland, Russia and many more. > it would make more sense to just forbid closed source software How did you make this leap from reverse engineering to closed vs. open source? > If the code was open, you wouldn't need to reverse engineer it. Even with the full source available you still have to analyse (read: reverse-engineer) the binaries, especially those widely shipped. > rather than violating their agreement Their agreement is void in many countries where reverse engineering is explicitly allowed (when done for the reasons of security and interoperability).
- jaawn 11y ago
  I think there may be a language barrier here. So, this should clear it up: The only definition of "reverse engineering software" that I use is this -- "Using tools and deep binary analysis to take a compiled binary, and convert it back to source code as close to the original as possible". It is a very specific definition. I do not mean general "analysis" or vulnerability testing or input manipulation, etc... only attempting to discover source code.
  - sklogic 11y ago
    > The only definition of "reverse engineering software" that I use Uhm, no, that's far too narrow. Reverse engineering is any kind of introspection into a device in question, designed for obtaining any degree of understanding of its inner functioning. What you're talking about is called "decompilation", and it's not even among the most useful reverse engineering techniques.
    - jaawn 11y ago
      People have different understandings of words, so I'm not claiming there is one, universal meaning of "software reverse engineering." However, here is the definition some researchers came up with: "Reverse engineering is the process of analyzing a subject system to create representations of the system at a higher level of abstraction. It can also be seen as "going backwards through the development cycle." (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering#Reverse_engineering_of_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering#Reverse_en... , original publication: http://win.ua.ac.be/~lore/Research/Chikofsky1990-Taxonomy.pdf http://win.ua.ac.be/~lore/Research/Chikofsky1990-Taxonomy.pd... ) edit: I just wanted to explain to you which definition I was using earlier, so that you could understand what I meant better.
      - sklogic 11y ago
        It does not really matter how we are interpreting the term "reverse engineering". What matters is how it was used in the OP article, in the EULAs and the national laws. In the article it was clearly applied to a binary analysis part of pen testing efforts by the Oracle customers, so this is what we should be discussing here.

by jaawn 11y ago

sklogic 11y ago

> Reverse engineering software is completely different from penetration testing How is it so? You cannot find funny vulnerabilities without reverse engineering the binaries. > It doesn't make sense for it to be illegal to forbid reverse engineering in a license agreement, where is that the case? France, Switzerland, Russia and many more. > it would make more sense to just forbid closed source software How did you make this leap from reverse engineering to closed vs. open source? > If the code was open, you wouldn't need to reverse engineer it. Even with the full source available you still have to analyse (read: reverse-engineer) the binaries, especially those widely shipped. > rather than violating their agreement Their agreement is void in many countries where reverse engineering is explicitly allowed (when done for the reasons of security and interoperability).

jaawn 11y ago
I think there may be a language barrier here. So, this should clear it up: The only definition of "reverse engineering software" that I use is this -- "Using tools and deep binary analysis to take a compiled binary, and convert it back to source code as close to the original as possible". It is a very specific definition. I do not mean general "analysis" or vulnerability testing or input manipulation, etc... only attempting to discover source code.
- sklogic 11y ago
  > The only definition of "reverse engineering software" that I use Uhm, no, that's far too narrow. Reverse engineering is any kind of introspection into a device in question, designed for obtaining any degree of understanding of its inner functioning. What you're talking about is called "decompilation", and it's not even among the most useful reverse engineering techniques.
  - jaawn 11y ago
    People have different understandings of words, so I'm not claiming there is one, universal meaning of "software reverse engineering." However, here is the definition some researchers came up with: "Reverse engineering is the process of analyzing a subject system to create representations of the system at a higher level of abstraction. It can also be seen as "going backwards through the development cycle." (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering#Reverse_engineering_of_software https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering#Reverse_en... , original publication: http://win.ua.ac.be/~lore/Research/Chikofsky1990-Taxonomy.pdf http://win.ua.ac.be/~lore/Research/Chikofsky1990-Taxonomy.pd... ) edit: I just wanted to explain to you which definition I was using earlier, so that you could understand what I meant better.
    - sklogic 11y ago
      It does not really matter how we are interpreting the term "reverse engineering". What matters is how it was used in the OP article, in the EULAs and the national laws. In the article it was clearly applied to a binary analysis part of pen testing efforts by the Oracle customers, so this is what we should be discussing here.