Hybrid Obfuscation Technique to Enhance Software Protection Against Reverse Engineering

Abstract

Reverse engineering has been a major challenging factor in software security since unauthorized analysis and manipulation of applications are made possible. This paper introduces a novel hybrid obfuscation technique intended to enhance the security of software against all such threats by means of a combined application of control flow and data obfuscation techniques. Our methodology systematically transforms software code to increase the complexity and obscure the functionality of code such that reverse engineering becomes challenging. This was developed in a prototype tool authored in C# and tested on the various metrics associated with execution time, code size, and resistance to decompilation. Results indicate that our hybrid technique achieves only a modest increase in execution time, in the order of up to 13%, but it makes a significant contribution to security as indicated by increases in cyclomatic complexity and reduced clarity regarding static analysis. Also, our technique demonstrates superiority over existing tools since, while incorporating a greater level of obfuscation complexity, it maintains fewer lines of code. This research elucidates the importance of hybrid obfuscation strategies for the protection of software against increasingly advanced reverse engineering techniques.