Draper Releases Machine Independent Decompiler to Open Source Community
CAMBRIDGE, MA-- Draper Laboratory has released an open source software tool that enables engineers to analyze a device’s embedded code independent of the microprocessor architecture on which it runs.
The Fracture™ decompiler is now available at: https://github.com/draperlaboratory/fracture.
Fracture™ translates machine instructions into a generic language—LLVM Intermediate Representation—enabling testing and analysis without prior knowledge of the program running in the microprocessor.
Fracture™ is likely to be used—and updated—by academics, cyber developers, and security researchers, and represents the first time a tool of this nature is available to the open source community, according to Brad Gaynor, Draper’s program manager for the project. Draper will continue to customize the decompiler for specialized applications.
The tool would be most valuable to device testers who do not have access to source code or familiarity with a specific instruction set architecture. In this case “it's an invaluable tool that eliminates months of time learning the details of a specific microprocessor to analyze the underlying program,” Gaynor said.
While Fracture™ currently supports ARM microprocessors, Draper has plans to add support for MIPS, PowerPC, Intel, and others in the near future. Fracture™’s technology roadmap includes recovering higher level programming language constructs and adding dynamic analysis capabilities based on integration with the LLVM interpreter.
Draper developed Fracture™ under contract to the Air Force Research Laboratory and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) as part of the High Assurance Cyber Military Systems (HACMS) program.