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Static Binary Code Instrumentation for ARM Architecture

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Book cover Perspectives of System Informatics (PSI 2017)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNTCS,volume 10742))

Abstract

Binary code analysis is becoming a prominent technique in software development, covering tasks related to quality assurance and security. In this paper, we present an approach to static binary code instrumentation—persistent modification and extension of executable files—that we believe to be effective when used as a basis of implementation of various dynamic analysis techniques. We have developed an instrumentation framework targeting ARM ELF binary code that allows transforming files based on user-defined specifications. Specification language provides means to perform aspect-oriented programming targeting low-level groups of points in binary code to insert extra instrumentation code that can be supplied in C/C++ language. We have applied our framework to Avalanche—an automatic input generation tool based on dynamic symbolic execution—and achieved up to 10x increase in path traversal speed within a limited time frame compared to Valgrind-based dynamic binary instrumentation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for System Programming of the Russian Academy of Sciences, 25, Alexander Solzhenitsyn st., Moscow, 109004, Russian Federation

    Mikhail Ermakov

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  1. Mikhail Ermakov
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Correspondence to Mikhail Ermakov .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Ivannikov Institute for System Programming of RAS, Moscow, Russia

    Alexander K. Petrenko

  2. The University of Manchester, Manchester, United Kingdom

    Andrei Voronkov

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Ermakov, M. (2018). Static Binary Code Instrumentation for ARM Architecture. In: Petrenko, A., Voronkov, A. (eds) Perspectives of System Informatics. PSI 2017. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 10742. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74313-4_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74313-4_9

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-74312-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-74313-4

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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