Colloquium Speaker

Speaker:	Grzegorz Wroblewski Microsoft Corporation Redmond, Washington
Topic:	Machine Code Obfuscation
Date:	Thursday, November 14, 2002
Time:	11:00 AM
Place:	Gould-Simpson, Room 701

ABSTRACT

Obfuscation can be a simple tool for software protection. Program obfuscation research has made significant progress in the past five years, thanks to many heuristic and theoretical approaches. Yet significant differences in definitions of program obfuscation given by different authors suggest, that the true nature of the program obfuscation processes is far from our understanding.

In my talk, I will present a method of machine code obfuscation, which can be applied to most present processors. The obfuscation method is based on a special theory describing computer resources used by a program in a given moment of processing time. I will describe a basic algorithm emerged from two useful theorems being part of the theory. The algorithm was implemented and tested using analytical and empirical approaches. I will show results of my tests and an estimation of well protecting obfuscation process parameters. During the talk I will overview current state of the are of the program obfuscation research and I will show how program obfuscation relates to the real world.