CSCI 4968
A university course repository teaching vulnerability research, reverse engineering, and binary exploitation through hands-on labs.
What is CSCI 4968?
Modern Binary Exploitation (MBE) is an open-source university course repository that teaches practical offensive security skills. It provides a complete curriculum with lectures, labs, and a custom wargame environment for learning binary exploitation and reverse engineering. The materials cover foundational concepts like buffer overflows and shellcoding, progressing to advanced topics such as kernel exploitation and modern mitigation bypasses.
Computer science students, security enthusiasts, and developers with C/C++ and basic assembly experience who want to learn binary exploitation from scratch. It's ideal for those entering cybersecurity or preparing for CTF competitions.
MBE offers a rare, academically-structured path into binary exploitation with hands-on labs and a pre-configured learning environment. Unlike fragmented online resources, it provides a complete, progression-based curriculum developed and tested in a university setting.
Overview
Course materials for Modern Binary Exploitation by RPISEC
Use Cases
Best For
- Learning binary exploitation fundamentals from scratch
- Practicing reverse engineering and vulnerability analysis in a structured environment
- Preparing for Capture The Flag (CTF) competitions with hands-on challenges
- Understanding modern exploit mitigations like ASLR, DEP, and stack canaries
- Studying kernel-level exploitation techniques on Linux
- Building a foundation for vulnerability research and exploit development careers
Not Ideal For
- Professionals seeking up-to-date exploit techniques for modern systems (e.g., Windows 11, ARM64, or latest Linux kernels)
- Complete beginners without any C/C++ or assembly programming experience
- Teams needing a quick reference or exploit toolkit rather than a full educational course
Pros & Cons
Pros
Offers 15 lectures and 10 labs that progress systematically from basic reverse engineering to advanced kernel exploitation, as outlined in the lecture breakdown.
Provides a pre-configured Ubuntu 14.04 VM with all tools and challenges set up, allowing for immediate practical application without complex setup.
Includes lecture slides, lab source code, and setup scripts, covering topics like stack overflows, ROP chains, and ASLR bypass in detail.
Teaches practical skills such as shellcoding, heap exploitation, and mitigation bypasses, based on real vulnerability research techniques.
Cons
Based on 2015 materials and Ubuntu 14.04 32-bit, which may not reflect modern systems with updated compilers, kernels, and security mitigations.
The README admits no lecture recordings are available, and lab solutions are not provided, which can hinder self-paced learning when stuck.
Relies on a specific VM setup that may be cumbersome to configure on newer hardware or virtualization platforms, and requires manual ASLR enabling after certain labs.
Frequently Asked Questions
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