Detect if your program is running inside a Virtual Machine

Elias Bachaalany

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4 Apr 2005CPOL5 min read

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An article showing how you can programmatically check if your code is running inside a virtual machine (such as VPC or VMWare).

vmdetect_files.zip
- Binaries
  - CSharpTest.exe
  - VBTest.exe
  - VmDetect.exe
  - VmDetectLibrary.dll
- Source
  - Common
    - DetectVM.cpp
    - DetectVM.h
  - CSharpTest
    - App.ico
    - AssemblyInfo.cs
    - CSharpTest.csproj
    - CSharpTest.csproj.user
    - Form1.cs
    - Form1.resx
  - VBTest
    - AssemblyInfo.vb
    - Form1.resx
    - Form1.vb
    - VBTest.vbproj
    - VBTest.vbproj.user
  - VCTest
    - ReadMe.txt
    - res
      - VmDetect.ico
      - VmDetect.rc2
      - vmware.ico
      - vpc.ico
    - resource.h
    - StdAfx.cpp
    - StdAfx.h
    - VmDetect.clw
    - VmDetect.cpp
    - VmDetect.dsp
    - VmDetect.dsw
    - VmDetect.h
    - VmDetect.rc
    - VmDetect.vcproj
    - VmDetectDlg.cpp
    - VmDetectDlg.h
  - VmDetect.sln
  - VmDetectLibrary
    - app.ico
    - app.rc
    - AssemblyInfo.cpp
    - ReadMe.txt
    - resource.h
    - Stdafx.cpp
    - Stdafx.h
    - VmDetectLibrary.cpp
    - VmDetectLibrary.h
    - VmDetectLibrary.vcproj

Imports System
Imports System.Reflection
Imports System.Runtime.InteropServices

' General Information about an assembly is controlled through the following 
' set of attributes. Change these attribute values to modify the information
' associated with an assembly.

' Review the values of the assembly attributes

<Assembly: AssemblyTitle("")> 
<Assembly: AssemblyDescription("")> 
<Assembly: AssemblyCompany("")> 
<Assembly: AssemblyProduct("")> 
<Assembly: AssemblyCopyright("")> 
<Assembly: AssemblyTrademark("")> 
<Assembly: CLSCompliant(True)> 

'The following GUID is for the ID of the typelib if this project is exposed to COM
<Assembly: Guid("134B90AC-FEEC-459B-8DA4-A4B9E4B2079E")> 

' Version information for an assembly consists of the following four values:
'
'      Major Version
'      Minor Version 
'      Build Number
'      Revision
'
' You can specify all the values or you can default the Build and Revision Numbers 
' by using the '*' as shown below:

<Assembly: AssemblyVersion("1.0.*")>

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License

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)

Written By

Elias Bachaalany

Web Developer

United States

Elias (aka lallousx86, @0xeb) has always been interested in the making of things and their inner workings.

His computer interests include system programming, reverse engineering, writing libraries, tutorials and articles.

In his free time, and apart from researching, his favorite reading topics include: dreams, metaphysics, philosophy, psychology and any other human/mystical science.

Former employee of Microsoft and Hex-Rays (the creators of IDA Pro), was responsible about many debugger plugins, IDAPython project ownership and what not.

Elias currently works as an Anticheat engineer in Blizzard Entertainment.

Elias co-authored 2 books and authored one book:

- Practical Reverse Engineering
- The Antivirus Hacker's Handbook
- The Art of Batch Files Programming

Detect if your program is running inside a Virtual Machine

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