Dotfuscator 4.9.6 to Ship February 11

February 9, 2011 4731 Views Sebastian Holst

New features include:

10X performance improvement for Runtime Intelligence messaging on Silverlight and XNA apps (on and off of the phone)
Expanded XAML obfuscation further improves IP protection

For Windows Phone 7 users, perhaps the most significant new feature will be, in fact, an invisible one; V4.9.6 includes a new analytics messaging implementation that offers a 10X performance improvement on the phone with a proportionate improvement in battery life preservation thrown in. This implementation employs a multi-threaded, “batch and send” approach.

If you think your app is at all sensitive to our (or anyone else’s) analytics traffic, I would encourage you to download the new version and retest. If you haven’t downloaded Dotfuscator and Runtime Intelligence for Windows Phone yet, you can get it right now at http://www.preemptive.com/windowsphone7.html

This performance enhancement applies to any Silverlight app - not just WP7 apps. Please note: multi-threaded messaging and caching was already supported on all other .NET applications.

Also included in this release (for apps both on and off of the phone) are incremental enhancements in XAML renaming obfuscation. If you are obfuscating your XAML, Dotfuscator will now provide automatic support (meaning no manual configuration or exclusions) for the renaming of attached properties, dependency properties, routed events, and attached events. This feature applies to Silverlight (WP7 and .NET) and WPF applications.

How do you get the new version? Registered Dotfuscator users with active maintenance (all WP7 developers are automatically included) can simply open their installed version of Dotfuscator and select “Check for Updates Now” under the Help menu. The link provided will step you through a simple upgrade path.

How do you take advantage of the performance improvements? Simply run your app through Dotfuscator again; there are no configuration changes required.

How do you take advantage of the extended XAML renaming capabilities? If you have already excluded instances of these specific properties/events in an existing configuration file, then you will need to “uncheck” those exclusions. New applications will be able to take advantage of the improved XAML protection capabilities from the start. Please note: as is always the case, if there are dependencies on these events/properties that cannot be detected through static analysis, then they will always need to be excluded.

When obfuscating XAML, always check the “warnings” panel for potentially “ambiguous” XAML during the initial configuration phase (and always test your apps post-obfuscation).

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Announcing the DashO v10.2 Release with Resource Encryption for Android

The DashO 10.2 release introduces a major new feature: Resource Encryption for Android. It's currently in beta, but is fully supported for production use. It allows you to encrypt the resources embedded in your APK, better protecting your Android application against static attacks.

This functionality integrates directly with your existing Gradle build, encrypting the resources during the standard build process. DashO then injects code into your protected application that will decrypt those resources at runtime.

Resource Encryption is off by default, but can be easily enabled in the DashO UI. The UI makes it easy to enable, or disable, the encryption of specific resources via drag and drop. It currently supports encrypting both assets and raw resources.

Once you install DashO 10.2, using this feature is easy.

Today we're announcing the first new major-version release of Dotfuscator in thirteen years: Dotfuscator Professional 6.0 Beta. It's an exciting new release with major new capabilities, but before we get into that, let's take a look at why it's been so long since we had a major release and why we're choosing to do one now.

For development teams, adding Dotfuscator to a build pipeline can often seem like a challenge; the value it adds is mostly gained by the surrounding business, and the cost of adding it is mostly borne by the development team. We understand that constraint, which is why we focus on making Dotfuscator as easy to integrate and maintain as possible. If you're a long-time user of Dotfuscator, you've probably experienced that - release after release of painless upgrades. That's our "first do no harm" philosophy in action.

The dynamic type in C# provides flexibility that is not available in other statically-typed languages. Since its introduction in C# 4.0 (.NET 4.5), we have worked with customers who wanted to know more about how dynamic types are impacted by the obfuscation process.

Malicious actors — like any thieves — live by a simple rule: If the front door is locked, break the window.

It’s why threats like fileless malware and crypto-jacking have seen substantial gains over last few years. It’s why — despite increasing employee education and IT training — hackers are still hooking phish by developing more sophisticated and authentic-looking email spoofs. Cybercriminal communities, meanwhile, continue to grow on the dark web, allowing attackers to share info, purchase exploit kits and identify potential targets.

What does this mean for CISOs? That typical defense efforts are being outpaced as familiar attack vectors are replaced with non-traditional threats. But it’s not all bad news; here are three questions every CISO needs to ask to help close the doors, bolt the windows and leave hackers out in the cold.

Gabriel, you have been in the security industry for over 2 decades. You have seen many different tools and services. Why create a company around something as specific as obfuscation and in-app protection?

Our customers build a lot of really innovative apps that enable their users and customers to do new and cool things. These apps frequently run on untrusted client computers/devices and they control access to customer’s sensitive data or critical devices.

And after all the effort of designing, building, debugging, and deploying their applications, the last thing they want is for an attacker to steal their work or use it to look for vulnerabilities to break into their system.

Long ago, we built a Java code optimizer, but it became clear to us that our customer cared more about the obfuscation effects of the optimization than the actual performance improvement. That is when we really began to focus on app protection. First with Java, then .NET, Android, iOS, Xamarin, JavaScript, etc.

Dotfuscator 4.9.6 to Ship February 11

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Non-Traditional Attack Vectors: Three Questions Every CISO Needs to Ask

Q&A With PreEmptive CEO Gabriel Torok

Gabriel, you have been in the security industry for over 2 decades. You have seen many different tools and services. Why create a company around something as specific as obfuscation and in-app protection?

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