Malimite – iOS and macOS Decompiler
35 comments
·January 26, 2025lauriewired
miki123211
Hi, is there any hope of getting Malimite to decompile libs from the Dyld cache?
Figuring out how an API works is one of the most important RE use cases, at least on Mac OS, where private APIs are still somewhat usable.
adeon
Starting this year I started learning bunch of security topics and Ghidra is something I started learning. I decompiled some games and getting comfortable how to work a project, teach Ghidra structures etc.
Am I right in looking at Malimite here and reading "Built on top of Ghidra decompilation to offer direct support for Swift, Objective-C, and Apple resources." that this is not a Ghidra extension but rather it is using a piece of Ghidra (the decompilation) like a backend? Malimite here is presented as its own piece of software.
Asking as a Ghidra noob who doesn't know all the ways Ghidra can be used: Would it make sense for something like this to be a Ghidra extension instead? I.e. give Ghidra some tooling/plugin to understand iOS apps or their languages better, instead of a new app that just uses parts of Ghidra. Also the Malimite screenshot in the page looks similar to Ghidra CodeBrowser tool.
Asking because it feels like it could be: from the little I've used Ghidra so far, looks like it is designed to be extendable, scriptable, usable by a team collaborating, etc. And Ghidra seems more holistic than just focusing on decompiling code.
lauriewired
It might be better to think of Malimite as "JADX but for iOS/Mac".
(JADX is a very popular Android decompiler)
Ghidra is quite limiting, and the workflow makes iOS reverse engineering quite cumbersome.
Malimite is intended to have a swappable back-end, so theoretically compilers other than Ghidra can be used in the future.
ghostpepper
What parts of ghidra do you find most limiting? I thought it was supposed to be "almost as good" as IDA in terms of features, if not UX polish.
lauriewired
Ghidra is very feature-rich for code decompilation, however it doesn't handle dropping in an entire application bundle; only single executables.
Apple application files are special, bundling up resources and (potentially multiple) executables into the same package.
Many of these resource files are important for analysis, but have custom encodings by Apple. Malimite "digests" this information into a logical way.
evanjrowley
LaurieWired's YouTube channel is pretty good. It features many quality deep dives on super nerdy topics. https://www.youtube.com/@lauriewired
kkarakk
wow, is that a voice filter? or is she really doing a baby voice?
lauriewired
That's just my natural speaking voice. I'm a small person, and everyone sounds different.
I'd be happy to focus on the tool, or the content of the channel, rather than how I sound.
brabel
Oh come'on, her voice is totally fine. She's a really good presenter and produces interesting, fairly advanced content in an accessible, entertaining way. I think criticizing her for something she can't change like this is extremely impolite.
ghoulishly
That’s a rude thing to say to a stranger; her voice is perfectly fine.
wiseowise
Do you also comment like that on every man’s channel that you watch?
saagarjha
(This is LLM-powered and based on Ghidra, fwiw)
lauriewired
It’s more like LLM-optional.
Malimite is first and foremost intended to be a tool to help Reverse Engineer iOS/Mac binaries, much like JADX for Android.
As it turns out, LLMs are quite good at “converting” C-Pseudocode into an approximation of the original Swift or Objective-C code. Therefore, you can optionally use the LLM extension to help analysis.
Of course, it’s not 100% accurate, but significantly easier to read, and I find it to save hours of manual research.
rgovostes
The prompts used are in this file: https://github.com/LaurieWired/Malimite/blob/main/src/main/j...
LeoPanthera
Who would have guessed just a few years ago that the final programming language would be English.
jhbadger
In the 1980s/early 1990s when HyperCard was king, that would have made sense. And in the late 1990s/early 2000s when Applescript was a thing people cared about, too. But yes, for the last twenty years or so, English-like programming languages weren't the thing.
tom_
The last trump has not sounded just yet. The day of judgement is still not quite at hand. It is - for now - still all to play for.
saagarjha
Kind of amused she uses raw format strings to generate JSON
zombot
Yea, and I want my decompiler to be deterministic, so LLM stuff is a no-no.
commandersaki
This is all well and good, but at least for iOS my understanding is you cannot decompile unless you have a jailbroken iPhone or security research device. Makes things a bit difficult.
null
surlyville
Jailbreak not required. I use TrollStore/TrollDecrypt but I'm sure there are other methods.
judge2020
For reference, it's possible because of a AMFI/CoreTrust bug in older iOS:
https://github.com/opa334/TrollStore/blob/main/README.md
> It works because of an AMFI/CoreTrust bug where iOS does not correctly verify code signatures of binaries in which there are multiple signers.
> Supported versions: 14.0 beta 2 - 16.6.1, 16.7 RC (20H18), 17.0
This seemed to happen because they didn't have time to release 17 with the bug fixed, which is why 16.7 Final is not supported; per https://x.com/MasterMike88/status/1743974453459956209
gondo
but how can one get IPA file to start with?
makeupartist
[dead]
anxixddjs
this is pretty cool wonder how long till apple files a complaint to gh
msephton
On what grounds could they complain?
msk-lywenn
Isn't decompiling illegal in the US?
zerr
It's usually against EULA, but that has nothing to do with the law, no?
densh
But is it illegal to provide tools for decompilation? As in shooting people is illegal, but selling guns is not.
Hi everyone, I'm the creator of Malimite. I actually released this as part of a conference talk at Objective By the Sea, which you can see here:
https://youtu.be/vWdKjVCZtTI
It gives a good overview of the development process as well as my motivations for creating it. The tool will also be on homebrew shortly :)