Sovellusten hakkerointi
Application hacking and vulnerabilites

Schedule

Thursdays 14:00-16:45 in Pasila, classroom pa5001. Bring your laptop!

This is an advanced course, so topics may change as the course progresses. We expect only the topics change, the dates and the hours are expected to stay unchanged.

Prerequisites

At the start of the course, you should know:

• Programming basics
• Linux basics
• Installing Linux on a virtual machine on your own laptop

For this Finnish implementation, you should be able to speak Finnish fluently; and read and write Finnish and English.

Prior knowledge acquired in any way is acceptable. Knowledge can be obtained, for example, from "Linux Servers" or "Programming 1" courses, but self-study is also fine.

Prerequisites may be verified with a survey if necessary, and course participants may be selected based on an initial test if needed.

Review Package

If you already know these things, you don't need the review package. You don't have to learn these specific languages. If an initial test is held during the course, questions won't be limited to the review package content.

Programming Basics

• The course involves coding and reading code
• Any language works (e.g., Python or C).
• Some students say that C is new to them but very useful in reverse engineering.
• Variable, data types (int, float, string, array/list), conditional statement (if-else), loops (for, while), function, class (class, object), execution order
• You can write simple programs
• You can read programming language and library manuals; and search the web for solutions to simple problems

If you want to review Python on Linux, you can start writing code like this:

$ python3
>>> print("Hello, Tero!")
>>> exit()

$ nano hello.py

And here you can write your program:

print("Hello, Tero!")

Save in nano with ctrl-X, y, enter. I personally install the 'micro' editor when I code more.

$ python3 hello.py
Hello, Tero!

And the language basics are explained here:

Homework

Homework report links are submitted to Laksu 24 hours before the contact session. After submitting your own assignment, you peer-assess two classmates' assignments.

Homework is done and reported after each class. Assignments can be published anywhere and the link submitted to Laksu. Homework reports must be in a format viewable directly in a browser, as a regular HTML web page. No odt, no odp, no ppt, no docx, no doc, no pdf. Homework cannot be submitted by email. Links are submitted to Laksu and then two works are peer-assessed. Free web hosting is available from WordPress.com, GitHub.com, and Gitlab.com.

Assignments are official only after they are given at the end of class. Even if the assignment might sometimes be on the web page before class, they should not be done in advance, as they are evaluated according to the given assignment. Significant changes may be made before confirmation.

Homework is reviewed at the next meeting, problems are solved together, and oral feedback is given. The grade for the homework package is given only at the end of the course, but assignments must still be submitted 24 hours before the next class. Those who don't start completing the course by submitting assignments will be removed from the course. Publishing is voluntary but highly recommended. If for some reason you don't dare or otherwise don't want to publish, you can put the work on a web page behind a password (the same password for all homework) and share this password with classmates. If tests on homework topics are held during classes, their points are included in the homework assessment.

Homework must be done by experimenting on a computer and reporting the course of events, unless otherwise stated in the specific subsection. Reports must contain information that can verify the exercises were done and not fabricated.

All sources used must be cited in the report: course assignment page, classmates' reports, man pages, books. The citation must show which information came from which source. If you ask AI for advice, it must be cited as a source, naming the AI model and specifics. AIs hallucinate; it's recommended to verify the information. Summaries or essays must not be generated with AI or similar techniques; they must be written yourself. It is forbidden to generate text with AI, as your classmates will be reading what you wrote.

Homework Tasks

We embed homework here in a new way, email teacher if you cannot see the tasks.