Custom software / licensing / software protection / systems analysis
ByteLab is an independent engineering practice. We build custom software, license and protect what you ship, and analyse, document and secure complex software systems, including legacy and undocumented environments.
Overview
ByteLab AS is a Norwegian software engineering company focused on custom software, licensing infrastructure, software protection and technical systems analysis. We help companies build, secure, maintain and understand complex software systems.
0x01 / Services
Four disciplines across the whole life of a binary: we work forward when you’re building, and backward when you’re stuck. When a problem reaches the kernel, so do we.
SRV/01
Applications, services and internal tooling built to fit how your business actually works, instead of bending your business around a tool that nearly fits. Yours to keep at the end: clean code, documentation, no lock-in.
SRV/02
A licensing model is a contract enforced by code. We design entitlement systems that survive contact with real customers (offline sites, air‑gapped networks, VM sprawl) and implement them with modern cryptography instead of obscurity.
SRV/03
Assume a hostile runtime. We layer anti‑tamper, integrity verification and targeted obfuscation (in user space, or in the kernel where it’s warranted) so that breaking your software costs more than buying it, and so you find out when someone tries.
SRV/04
When source, documentation or the original vendor is gone, we analyse and document what your systems actually do, so you can maintain, secure, integrate or safely replace them. Reverse engineering is used where it’s the right tool, always on systems you own or are authorised to assess.
0x02 / Method
Fixed scope or retained, always documented, never a black box. Four phases, each with a concrete output you keep.
Phase 01
We model the threat before touching code: who attacks your software, with what tools, for what gain. Your current licensing and protection get the same scrutiny an attacker would give them.
Output → Findings memo & threat model
Phase 02
Mechanisms on paper first (licensing model, protection layers, key handling), each costed for build impact, performance and maintenance before a line is written.
Output → Mechanism specification
Phase 03
We integrate into your codebase and CI, not beside it. Everything we add is documented, testable and owned by your team on handover.
Output → Integrated, reviewed code
Phase 04
Then we switch sides and attack our own work: measuring time‑to‑bypass, closing what we find, and writing down what would break next.
Output → Adversarial review report
0x03 / Working surface
The shipped binary is the material: bytes on disk, mapped into memory, running in front of a hostile world. This is the ground we stand on and the range we cover.
Fig. 02 · live read. What’s in the bytes is the whole job.
0x04 / About
Protection is a moving target. We treat it as an engineering discipline. Measured, versioned, verified. Never a checkbox.
ByteLab AS is a Norwegian privately held software company based in Stathelle, Norway. Org.nr. 933 031 861.
ByteLab is a small, senior practice. The people you meet are the people who do the work, engineers who have shipped licensing systems, hardened commercial software and spent years inside other people’s binaries.
We keep the team small on purpose. This is precision work, and precision doesn’t delegate well.
We work the defender’s side. We protect and analyse software for the people who own or license it. When our work turns up a flaw that affects a third party, it goes through coordinated disclosure, never into the wild.
0x05 / Contact
A short description of your software and what you need is enough to start. We reply within two working days, and an NDA is never a problem.