Muhammad Alief is an Android developer and mobile security engineer. Kotlin, clean architecture, reverse engineering and CTF write-ups.https://www.alieflab.com/en-usSun, 04 Oct 2026 03:31:58 GMTAstro vAstro v5.14.5https://www.alieflab.com/blog/recover-deleted-git-commit-forensics/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/recover-deleted-git-commit-forensics/A hands-on demonstration of forensic Git analysis showing how a removed commit containing sensitive information was recovered using commit history checkout during a CTF challenge.Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 GMTForensicforensicgitchallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/forensic-exif-hidden-base64/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/forensic-exif-hidden-base64/Identifying hidden Base64 strings inside EXIF metadata and decoding them to recover a concealed flag — a practical forensic analysis approach used in CTF challenges.Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 GMTForensicforensicexifchallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/layered-base64-rot13-decryption/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/layered-base64-rot13-decryption/Step-by-step analysis of a multi-layer encoding challenge where nested Base64 and ROT13 shifting were used to obscure a flag — demonstrating practical CTF cryptography skills.Fri, 23 May 2025 00:00:00 GMTCryptographycryptographycaesarbase64challengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/windows-event-viewer-malware-behavior-log-analysis/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/windows-event-viewer-malware-behavior-log-analysis/A malware investigation using Windows Event Viewer logs uncovered the infection path, identified the malicious process, and decoded a Base64-encoded secret embedded in the execution chain.Wed, 02 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMTMalware Analysisevent-viewermalwarechallengepico-ctfwindowsmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/malware-analysis-fakegpt-browser-extension-static-review/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/malware-analysis-fakegpt-browser-extension-static-review/A structured malware analysis exercise on a malicious FakeGPT browser extension. Static code inspection was performed to answer investigative questions and identify behaviors relevant to Blue Team defense.Fri, 21 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMTMalware Analysisreverse-engineeringbrowser-extensionmalwarechallengecyber-defendermalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/manual-smali-patching-android-function-redirect/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/manual-smali-patching-android-function-redirect/A manual Smali patch was applied to an Android APK after static analysis revealed that the flag function was never called. Redirecting the function call and rebuilding the app exposed the hidden flag.Wed, 31 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMTMobile Securityreverse-engineeringmanualsmali-patchingchallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-smali-patching-redirect-function-call/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-smali-patching-redirect-function-call/A static analysis of an Android APK uncovered misleading password logic designed to hide the real flag function. By modifying the Smali code to patch the function call, the correct method was executed and the flag recovered.Wed, 31 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMTMobile Securityreverse-engineeringlogic-bypasssmali-patchingchallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-weak-obfuscation-password-decoding/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-weak-obfuscation-password-decoding/Static analysis of an Android app revealed a weak password protection mechanism based on simple arithmetic and string manipulation. Manually decoding the logic exposed the correct password and retrieved the flag.Tue, 30 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMTMobile Securityreverse-engineeringandroidweak-codechallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-strings-xml-hardcoded-secret-static-analysis/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-strings-xml-hardcoded-secret-static-analysis/Reverse engineering an Android app revealed a secret key stored in strings.xml. By tracing input validation and comparing the stored value, the hidden flag was successfully exposed.Mon, 29 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMTMobile Securityreverse-engineeringandroidstrings.xmlchallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-logcat-sensitive-data-exposure/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/android-logcat-sensitive-data-exposure/Runtime analysis of an Android app revealed sensitive data exposed through Logcat logs. By triggering the native function and monitoring logs, the hidden flag was retrieved.Sun, 28 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMTMobile Securityreverse-engineeringandroidlogcatchallengepico-ctfmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)https://www.alieflab.com/blog/react-native-apk-static-analysis-exposed-api-token/https://www.alieflab.com/blog/react-native-apk-static-analysis-exposed-api-token/A walkthrough of reversing a React Native APK using JADX and bundle inspection to expose a hard-coded API token, demonstrating practical static analysis skills in mobile security.Wed, 04 May 2022 00:00:00 GMTMobile Securityreverse-engineeringreact-nativeapkchallengenahamconmalief.dev@gmail.com (Muhammad Alief)