Introduction

What is BinCAT?

BinCAT is a static Binary Code Analysis Toolkit, designed to help reverse engineers, directly from IDA.

It features:

• value analysis (registers and memory)
• taint analysis
• type reconstruction and propagation
• backward and forward analysis

In action

You can check (an older version of) BinCAT in action here:

• Basic analysis
• Using data tainting

Check the tutorial out to see the corresponding tasks.

Quick FAQ

Supported host platforms:

• IDA plugin: all, version 6.9 or later (BinCAT uses PyQt, not PySide)
• analyzer (local or remote): Linux, Windows, macOS (maybe)

Supported CPU for analysis (for now):

• x86-32
• ARMv7
• ARMv8

Installation

Analyzer

The analyzer can be used locally or through a Web service.

On Windows, the binary distribution includes the analyzer.

On Linux:

• Using Docker: Docker installation instructions
• Manual: Manual installation instructions

IDA Plugin

Only IDA v6.9 or later (7 included) are supported

Install for Windows

• Unzip BinCAT
• In IDA, click on "File -> Script File..." menu (or type ALT-F7)
• Select install_plugin.py
• BinCAT is now installed in your IDA user dir
• Restart IDA

Or install manually.

Linux install

Installation instructions

BinCAT should work with IDA on Wine, once pip is installed:

• download https://bootstrap.pypa.io/get-pip.py (verify it's good ;)
• ~/.wine/drive_c/Python27/python.exe get-pip.py

Using BinCAT

Quick start

• Load the plugin by using the Ctrl-Shift-B shortcut, or using the Edit -> Plugins -> BinCAT menu

• Go to the instruction where you want to start the analysis

• Select the BinCAT Configuration pane, click <-- Current to define the start address

• Launch the analysis

Configuration

Global options can be configured through the Edit/BinCAT/Options menu.

Default config and options are stored in $IDAUSR/idabincat/conf.

Options

• "Use remote bincat": select if you are running docker in a Docker container
• "Remote URL": http://localhost:5000 (or the URL of a remote BinCAT server)
• "Autostart": autoload BinCAT at IDA startup
• "Save to IDB": default state for the save to idb checkbox

Documentation

A manual is provided and check here for a description of the configuration file format.

A tutorial is provided to help you try BinCAT's features.

Article and presentations about BinCAT

• SSTIC 2017, Rennes, France: article (english), slides (french), video of the presentation (french)
• REcon 2017, Montreal, Canada: slides, video

Licenses

BinCAT is released under the GNU Affero General Public Licence.

The BinCAT OCaml code includes code from the original Ocaml runtime, released under the LGPLv2.

The BinCAT IDA plugin includes code from python-pyqt5-hexview by Willi Ballenthin, released under the Apache License 2.0.