Obscuring Control Flow Anti-Disassembly

Obscuring control flow is an anti-disassembling technique that involves using methods of flow control that are difficult or impossible for disassemblers and debuggers to follow. This can make it more difficult for analysts to understand the program's behavior and can also make it more difficult for other tools, such as debuggers, to accurately interpret the program.

One example of this …

AddVectoredExceptionHandler Anti-Debugging

The AddVectoredExceptionHandler technique is an anti-debugging method that can detect the presence of debuggers using Vectored Exception Handlers. This technique works by calling AddVectoredExceptionHandler(1, ourHandler) to register a top-level exception handler that will catch any exceptions raised by the process, including those generated by debuggers.

After this call has taken place, stepping through the code will trigger an EXCEPTION_SINGLE_STEP exception, …

Misusing Structured Exception Handlers Anti-Disassembly

Misusing Structured Exception Handlers is a technique used by malware to make it more difficult for security analysts to reverse engineer the code. Structured Exception Handlers (SEH) are functions that are used to handle exceptions in a program. These can be misused by malware to fool disassemblers and make it harder to analyze the code. One way this is done …

Unhandled Exception Filter Anti-Debugging

An application-defined function that passes unhandled exceptions to the debugger, if the process is being debugged. Otherwise, it optionally displays an application error message box and causes the exception handler to be executed.

If an exception occurs and no exception handler is registered, the UnhandledExceptionFilter function will be called. It is possible to register a custom unhandled exception filter using …

Adding antivirus exception Antivirus/EDR Evasion

Another way for a malware is to add an exception into the antivirus.

Interrupts Anti-Debugging

Adversaries may use exception-based anti-debugging techniques to detect whether their code is being executed in a debugger. These techniques rely on the fact that most debuggers will trap exceptions and not immediately pass them to the process being debugged for handling.

By triggering an exception and checking whether it is handled properly, the adversary's code can determine whether it is …

CloseHandle, NtClose Anti-Debugging

When a process is debugged, calling NtClose or CloseHandle with an invalid handle will generate a STATUS_INVALID_HANDLE exception.

The exception can be cached by an exception handler. If the control is passed to the exception handler, it indicates that a debugger is present.

Call to Interrupt Procedure Anti-Debugging

This anti-debugging technique involves using the INT n instruction to generate a call to the interrupt or exception handler specified with the destination operand.

To implement this technique, the int 0x03 instruction is executed, followed by a ret (0xCD03, 0xC3) nested in a __try, __except block. If a debugger is present, the except block will not be executed, and …

IN Sandbox Evasion

The IN instruction is a type of machine code instruction that is used to read data from an input port. This instruction can only be executed in privileged mode, such as in kernel mode, and an attempt to execute it in user mode will generate an exception.

However, some virtual machine monitors, such as VMWare, use a special port called …

INT3 Instruction Scanning Anti-Debugging

Instruction INT3 is an interruption which is used as Software breakpoints. These breakpoints are set by modifying the code at the target address, replacing it with a byte value 0xCC (INT3 / Breakpoint Interrupt).

The exception EXCEPTION_BREAKPOINT (0x80000003) is generated, and an exception handler will be raised. Malware identify software breakpoints by scanning for the byte 0xCC in the protector …

Search Evasion Techniques

Search Result