Reverse Engineering Swift Applications

Explore reverse engineering techniques for Swift applications in this comprehensive conference talk from HITB Security Conference. Delve into the Swift language from a security perspective, covering topics such as obtaining class information from Swift binaries, Objective-C/Swift bridging, Swift runtime manipulation, and function hooking. Learn about the challenges faced when reversing Swift apps, including symbol table analysis, name mangling, and working with stripped binaries. Gain insights into Objective-C compatibility and various methods for class dumping. Discover practical approaches to hooking Swift methods and understand the next steps in Swift application security testing.

Syllabus

Intro
Motivation
How Does Swift Affect Testing?
What is Swift?
Syntax (just the basics to follow along)
Other Language Features
Challenges
Reversing Swift Apps
Class Dump?
Symbol Table
Name Mangling
Function Attributes
Return Types
swift-demangle
class-dump-s
Stripped Binaries
Objective-C Compatibility
Revisiting Class Dump
Other Options
Hooking Swift Methods
Wrap Up
Next Steps