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> So I was able to use the utility to discover and defeat the trial protection of itself. This is why I used to feel bad for Hex Rays / IDA Pro. When your prod

> So I was able to use the utility to discover and defeat the trial protection of itself. This is why I used to feel bad for Hex Rays / IDA Pro. When your product is a disassembler, there's bound to be someone in your target audience capable of cracking your software. P.S. Don't use a cracked IDA Pro. Checkout Hopper instead. It's reasonably priced and really solid software. Been using it on and off for years.

emidln 5y ago
Cracking IDA Pro used to be part of the experience.
- stevekemp 5y ago
  For me it was Numega's SoftICE, which was an amazing debugger. Using it to defeat it's own protection always struck me as ironic, but I guess also to be expected. I hacked software for many years, for my personal amusement rather than profit, as it always reminded me of being a teenager hacking games for infinite lives, etc. Now and again I take a stab at commercial linux software, but there isn't so much out there with the standard "Enter License Key" kinda protection.
  - takeda 5y ago
    > as it always reminded me of being a teenager hacking games for infinite lives, etc Now you have Cheat Engine[1] specializing just on that [1] https://cheatengine.org/ https://cheatengine.org/
mike_d 5y ago
My Google-fu is failing me at the moment, but I remember a piece of malware actually included the copyright string of a disassembler so it would detect "itself" and not let you analyze the malware sample.
- robertlagrant 5y ago
  Going to show just how rudimentary said scanning is sometimes.
- grover12 5y ago
  Hey mike_d, I remember this as well. Using my google-fu, I found it. Google: "hopper disassembler" copyright text OR string https://alexomara.com/blog/a-silly-anti-disassembly-trick/ https://alexomara.com/blog/a-silly-anti-disassembly-trick/ backup links: https://web.archive.org/web/20210830080742/https://alexomara.com/blog/a-silly-anti-disassembly-trick/ https://web.archive.org/web/20210830080742/https://alexomara... https://archive.is/uzga3 https://archive.is/uzga3
  - Benjamin_Dobell 5y ago
    From the article: > One of the limitations to at-least the demo of Hopper is that it is not able to disassemble itself. I was curious as to whether this limitation was present in the latest licensed version of Hopper (4.8.2). I can confirm that I can indeed disassemble Hopper itself. Whether there's some intentional mistakes in that disassembly I don't really have time to delve into, unfortunately.
rurban 5y ago
Nope, ghidra. Better disassembler
- Namidairo 5y ago
  The inbuilt vtable detection is nice, you don't have to remember to update and run Class Informer every time you want to look at a vtable...
jonpalmisc 5y ago
I'd suggest checking out Binary Ninja [1] as well. Also reasonably priced and very solid, but available on all platforms --- not to mention having a much nicer UI and API than all the other tools out there. [1] https://binary.ninja https://binary.ninja Disclosure: I'm currently an intern working on the product.

emidln 5y ago

Cracking IDA Pro used to be part of the experience.

stevekemp 5y ago
For me it was Numega's SoftICE, which was an amazing debugger. Using it to defeat it's own protection always struck me as ironic, but I guess also to be expected. I hacked software for many years, for my personal amusement rather than profit, as it always reminded me of being a teenager hacking games for infinite lives, etc. Now and again I take a stab at commercial linux software, but there isn't so much out there with the standard "Enter License Key" kinda protection.
- takeda 5y ago
  > as it always reminded me of being a teenager hacking games for infinite lives, etc Now you have Cheat Engine[1] specializing just on that [1] https://cheatengine.org/ https://cheatengine.org/

mike_d 5y ago

My Google-fu is failing me at the moment, but I remember a piece of malware actually included the copyright string of a disassembler so it would detect "itself" and not let you analyze the malware sample.

robertlagrant 5y ago
Going to show just how rudimentary said scanning is sometimes.
grover12 5y ago
Hey mike_d, I remember this as well. Using my google-fu, I found it. Google: "hopper disassembler" copyright text OR string https://alexomara.com/blog/a-silly-anti-disassembly-trick/ https://alexomara.com/blog/a-silly-anti-disassembly-trick/ backup links: https://web.archive.org/web/20210830080742/https://alexomara.com/blog/a-silly-anti-disassembly-trick/ https://web.archive.org/web/20210830080742/https://alexomara... https://archive.is/uzga3 https://archive.is/uzga3
- Benjamin_Dobell 5y ago
  From the article: > One of the limitations to at-least the demo of Hopper is that it is not able to disassemble itself. I was curious as to whether this limitation was present in the latest licensed version of Hopper (4.8.2). I can confirm that I can indeed disassemble Hopper itself. Whether there's some intentional mistakes in that disassembly I don't really have time to delve into, unfortunately.

rurban 5y ago

Nope, ghidra. Better disassembler

Namidairo 5y ago
The inbuilt vtable detection is nice, you don't have to remember to update and run Class Informer every time you want to look at a vtable...

jonpalmisc 5y ago

I'd suggest checking out Binary Ninja [1] as well. Also reasonably priced and very solid, but available on all platforms --- not to mention having a much nicer UI and API than all the other tools out there. [1] https://binary.ninja https://binary.ninja Disclosure: I'm currently an intern working on the product.