Any experience with CryptoObfuscator or CryptoLicensing?

Question

I'm on the market for a good (and cheap) .Net obfuscator. I'm developing a .Net windows forms application.

I evaluated IntelliLock and SmartAssebly so far. I quit the first on lack of support (I sent two emails with no response, no support site, etc). SmartAssebly looks pretty good but is too rich for my blood.

Has anyone used CryptoObfuscator? Any good or bad experiences?

Once, I have you here, what about CryptoLicensing?

Thanks

Answer 1

You can check Roy Osherove post on Crypto Licensing from last June. Roy is the VP R&D at the company I work in and I appreciate his opinion, we seriously consider using these two tools in our future products.

Answer 2

I've been using CryptoLicensing and CryptoObfuscator for over a year now and have found them both to be very good products with good price points. Don't think that because an obfuscator is expensive it's got to be better either! Check this thread for a comparison of obfuscators:

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/337134/what-is-the-best-net-obfuscator-on-the-market/1543040

I use CryptoLicensing too and would say the same about it as their obfuscator - it's good and has flexibility for different scenarios. It also comes with support for common scenarios out of the box.

The only thing I'd say bad is that their UI could do with a bit of a polish. Other than that they're very strong products with good documenation and good email support. I run the obfuscator from my build process too and it works a treat.

Answer 3

User of crypto obfuscator for un couple of months - I find it quite easy to use and their support mail very helpful. The output is not understable on usual tools like ILDASM, Reflector ILSPY or JustDecompile (but I'm no hacker).

However, one day my antivirus Avast killed the obfuscator output (in the bud). Complained to Avast as false positive and it went away with later updates. Suspect the Control Flow Obfuscation option but can't be sure.

My software has automatic update and creates updated exe which can be blocked by the AV. So your customers may risk not getting updates, and new customers can't install, while the AV manufacturer checks your claims.

It seems that if your software is code signed, you don't get such alerts: see this http://wyday.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=21786

Hope this helps today's readers.

Answer 4

The problem I have with this product is the pricing if you go with the 12 months upgrades or license renewal it costs about $259 more that's a lot for a $649 product. Also if you do your research the product had a few goof ups in the past that make me wary.

Take a good look at Babel .NET obfuscator. It's free version is still very good and one of the few that don't lock you to one machine if you decide to purchase. Its possibly the best I found if you can get over using the command line only.