[SC-L] Managing the insider threat through code obfuscation

[Kenneth R. van Wyk]

This morning, an article caught my attention -- "Managing the insider threat 
through code obfuscation", 
http://www.itmanagersjournal.com/article.pl?sid=05/12/13/1736253

The article's premise is that, because attackers can find out a great deal 
about the internals of databases and such by decompiling bytecode (in Java 
and .NET), bytecode should be obfuscated to hide its internal details.  The 
article points to several commercial bytecode obfuscation products: 
http://www.devdirect.com/ALL/OBFUSCATIORS_PCAT_2014.aspx

I hadn't heard of this approach before, although I'm quite familiar with how 
easy it is to decompile Java bytecode.  My questions for the group are:

o Anyone here have any good/bad experiences with bytecode obfuscation?
o What is the impact on performance of the bytecode?
o How about compatibility with various JVMs?
o How much protection do these obfuscators really provide?
o Is this all just a bunch of product marketing hooey?

Well, at least the article uses the term "threat" correctly...

Cheers,

Ken van Wyk
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KRvW Associates, LLC
http://www.KRvW.com