You're reading from Mobile App Reverse Engineering Get started with discovering, analyzing, and exploring the internals of Android and iOS apps

Product type Paperback

Published in May 2022

Publisher Packt

ISBN-13 9781801073394

Length 166 pages

Edition 1st Edition

Languages

Tools

Android

Concepts

Reverse Engineering

Author (1):

Abhinav Mishra

View More author details

Table of Contents (13) Chapters

Preface

1. Section 1: Basics of Mobile App Reverse Engineering, Common Tools and Techniques, and Setting up the Environment

2. Chapter 1: Basics of Reverse Engineering – Understanding the Structure of Mobile Apps FREE CHAPTER

3. Chapter 2: Setting Up a Mobile App Reverse Engineering Environment Using Modern Tools

4. Section 2: Mobile Application Reverse Engineering Methodology and Approach

5. Chapter 3: Reverse Engineering an Android Application

6. Chapter 4: Reverse Engineering an iOS Application

7. Chapter 5: Reverse Engineering an iOS Application (Developed Using Swift)

8. Section 3: Automating Some Parts of the Reverse Engineering Process

9. Chapter 6: Open Source and Commercial Reverse Engineering Tools

10. Chapter 7: Automating the Reverse Engineering Process

11. Chapter 8: Conclusion

12. Other Books You May Enjoy

Chapter 6: Open Source and Commercial Reverse Engineering Tools

In the chapters so far, we have discussed reverse engineering iOS and Android applications. We mainly used open source tools, with one exception – Hopper Disassembler. Once you start reverse engineering real-world mobile applications, on both Android and iOS, you might find some alternative tools as well. Those alternatives can also be open source or commercial (closed source).

All the open source tools we have used so far, such as APKTool, Ghidra, and Radare2, are all free to use, and the closed source one, Hopper Disassembler, is commercially available. So, for the remaining part of the chapter, let's consider what we mean by closed source when we are talking about commercially available tools.

Different reverse engineering tools offer different (and unique) features. It also often becomes a personal choice of which tool you want to use, and for what purpose. For example, I prefer using Hopper Disassembler...