How to hide a string in binary code?

Question

Sometimes, it is useful to hide a string from a binary (executable) file. For example, it makes sense to hide encryption keys from binaries.

When I say “hide”, I mean making strings harder to find in the compiled binary.

For example, this code:

const char* encryptionKey = "My strong encryption key";
// Using the key

after compilation produces an executable file with the following in its data section:

4D 79 20 73 74 72 6F 6E-67 20 65 6E 63 72 79 70   |My strong encryp|
74 69 6F 6E 20 6B 65 79                           |tion key        |

You can see that our secret string can be easily found and/or modified.

I could hide the string…

char encryptionKey[30];
int n = 0;
encryptionKey[n++] = 'M';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'y';
encryptionKey[n++] = ' ';
encryptionKey[n++] = 's';
encryptionKey[n++] = 't';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'r';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'o';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'n';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'g';
encryptionKey[n++] = ' ';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'e';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'n';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'c';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'r';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'y';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'p';
encryptionKey[n++] = 't';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'i';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'o';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'n';
encryptionKey[n++] = ' ';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'k';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'e';
encryptionKey[n++] = 'y';

…but it's not a nice method. Any better ideas?

PS: I know that merely hiding secrets doesn't work against a determined attacker, but it's much better than nothing…

Also, I know about assymetric encryption, but it's not acceptable in this case. I am refactoring an existing appication which uses Blowfish encryption and passes encrypted data to the server (the server decrypts the data with the same key).

I can't change the encryption algorithm because I need to provide backward compatibility. I can't even change the encryption key.

Answer 1

You can encode the string using some trivial encoding, e.g. xor with binary 01010101. No real protection of course, but foils the use of tools like string.

Answer 2

Here is a example of what they explained, but be aware this will be fairly simply broken by anyone thats a "hacker" but will stop kiddies with a hex editor. The example i provided simply adds the value 80 and subtracks the index from it and then makes a string again. If you where planning on storing this in a binary file then there are plenty of ways to convert a string to a byte[] array.

When you have this working in your app, i would make the "math" i used a bit more complex

To make it clear, for those not understanding.... You encrypt the string before you save it so its NOT saved in clear text. If the encrypted text is never gonna change you dont even include the encrypt function in your release, you just have the decrypt one. So when you want to decrypt the string, you read the file, and then decrypt the content. Meaning your string is never gonna be stored on file in plain text format.

You can off course also have the encrypted string stored as a constants string in your application and decrypt when you need it, choose what is right for you problem depending on the size of the string and how often it changes.

string Encrypted = EncryptMystring("AAbbBb");
string Decrypted = DecryptMystring(Encrypted);

string DecryptMystring(string RawStr)
    {
        string DecryptedStr = "";
        for (int i = 0; i < RawStr.Length; i++)
        {
            DecryptedStr += (char)((int)RawStr[i] - 80 + i);
        }

        return DecryptedStr;
    }

    string EncryptMystring(string RawStr)
    {
        string EncryptedStr = "";
        for (int i = 0; i < RawStr.Length; i++)
        {
            EncryptedStr += (char)((int)RawStr[i] + 80 - i);
        }

        return EncryptedStr;
    }