SOFTWARE SECURITY

This course aims at introducing advanced concepts and techniques of software security.
In the first part of the course, we will cover software protection against reverse engineering and Man-At-The-End (MATE) attacks, with laboratory and practical examples.
In the second part of the course, we will cover various topics related to software security on different types of systems.

The goal of the course is to transfer knowledge of
- the importance of sofware protection from MATE attacks based on reverse engineering
- the use of software protection tools like obfuscation, tamper-proofing and watermarking.
- different topics in software security: malware and cybercrime, anonymity and privacy, threat and attack modelling, e-voting systems
The labs will help experimenting with tools and acquiring practical knowledge of the topics.

It is necessary to have attended the course SYSTEM SECURITY.

It is advisable to attend all the lectures as the course has theoretical and practical components.
The learning of concepts is eased by the use of software tools in the labs and discussion of practical examples.

The course will present different topics:
- Binary code analysis and reverse engineering
- Software protection from analysis: obfuscations and white-box cryptography
- Software integrity protection: tamperproofing and code-guards
- Software authorship protection: watermarking and Digital Rights Management
- Software protection against piracy
- Malware analysis and Cybercrime
- Threat and Attack modelling
- Advanced topics in Software Security: e-Voting, anonymity and privacy.

Lecture Notes from the Professor, mostly based on:
1. Christian Collberg, Jasvir Nagra; Surreptitious Software: Obfuscation, Watermarking, and Tamperproofing for Software Protection, 2009, Addison-Wesley Professional, ISBN 978-0321549259, First Edition.
2. Adam Shostack; Threat Modeling: Designing for Security, 2014, Wiley, ISBN 978-1118809990
3. Chris Eagle, Kara Nance; The Ghidra book: the Definitive Guide, 2020, No Starch Press, ISBN-13: 978-1-71850-102-7
4. Vijay Kumar Velu, Robert Beggs; Kali Linux for Advanced Penetration Testing- Third Edition, 2019, Packt Publishing, ISBN 978-1-78934-056-3

The assessment is based on written exam, and an optional assignment.
The written exam aims at verifying the knowledge of the different topics of the course.
The assignment is not mandatory and consist of a problem to solve, or in making a presentation to the class of a research paper.
Solving assignments give extra score with respect to the the mark of the written exam.

Theoretical lectures and practical laboratory classes;
Audio and Video online resources;
Chat and forum;
Assignments on various topics that give extra score;
Practical labs

English

written