System and method for protecting digital goods using random and automatic code obfuscation

A method comprising:

• segmenting a digital good into a plurality of segments;
• selecting multiple segments from the plurality of segments;
• transforming only the selected segments according to different protection techniques to produce a protected digital good having a composite of variously protected segments;
• augmenting at least one segment using a certain protection technique;
• and
• inserting a checkpoint within the protected digital good but outside of the augmented segment and at a varying position relative to the augmented segment, the checkpoint being configured upon being encountered in the digital good to invoke a function call to to validate that the augmented segment has not been tampered with based on the certain protection techniques used to produce the at least one protected segment.

A method comprising:

• establishing parameters prescribing a desired quantity of protection to be applied to a software product in generating a protected software product;
• parsing the software product into code sections;
• selecting at least one code section;
• augmenting the selected code section to add protection qualities to generate an augmented code section;
• generating a checkpoint configured to cause a system receiving the augmented code section to invoke a function call to validate that the augmented code section has not been tampered with based on the protection qualities added to generate the augmented code section;
• determining a checkpoint position for the checkpoint to be inserted in the protected software product, the checkpoint position being outside of a position of the augmented code section and at an offset to the augmented section that is varied from additional checkpoint positions associated with other augmented code sections;
• and
• repeating the selecting and the augmenting for different code sections until the desired quantity of protection has been applied.

A production system, comprising:

• a memory to store an original digital good;
• a production server equipped with a set of multiple protection tools that may be used to augment the original digital good for protection purposes, the production server being configured to:
• parse the original digital good and apply protection tools selected from the set of protection tools only to selected portions of the original digital good in a random manner to produce a protected digital good having a composite of the protected selected portions;
• generate a plurality of checkpoints, each of the checkpoints being associated with and positioned outside of one of the protected selected portions and causing a system receiving the protected digital good, upon encountering each of the checkpoints, to invoke a function call to validate the protected selected portions associated with each of the checkpoints have not been tampered with based on the protection tools used to produce the protected selected portions;
• and
• insert the plurality of checkpoints within the protected digital good, the positions of each of the plurality of checkpoints being one of variably offset and randomly offset outside of the protected selected portions with which each of the checkpoints is associated.

An obfuscation system, comprising:

• a parser to parse a digital good into a plurality of segments;
• a set of protection tools that may be applied to the segments of the digital good to augment the segments with protection qualities;
• a target segment selector to select at least one segment from the plurality of segments;
• a tool selector to select at least one protection tool from the set of protection tools and apply the selected protection tool to the selected segment so that a protection tool of the set of protection tools is applied only to a selected segment of the plurality of segments to generate a plurality of protected selected segments;
• and
• a checkpoint generator to create checkpoints for at least a portion of the protected selected segments, the checkpoints being assigned positions outside of the protected selected segments at variable positions relative to each of the protected selected segments, the checkpoints being operable to cause a system receiving the plurality of protected selected segments, upon encountering the checkpoints, to invoke a function call to validate authenticity of the protected selected segments based on the protection tool applied to generate the plurality of protected selected segments.

One or more computer-readable media having computer-executable instructions that, when executed, direct a computing device to:

• parse a digital good into a plurality of segments;
• apply multiple different protection tools to only a selected portion of the segments in a random manner to produce a protected digital good having a composite of variously protected portions;
• and
• insert a plurality of checkpoints into the protected digital good at positions one of variably and randomly offset from the variously protected portions, such that upon encountering each of the plurality of checkpoints, a receiving computing system executing the protected digital good will invoke a function call to authenticate that variously protected portions have not been tampered with based on the at least one of the multiple different protection tools used to produce the variously protected portions.