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How to trace network input to dangerous sinks in a binary with Ablation

Find functions reachable from network reads that feed risky command or sink calls.

Authorization notice. Ablation is dual-use. Only use it on software, sites and systems you own or have explicit permission to test.

Reverse engineering. Only run this analysis on binaries you own or are authorized to test, since it searches for exploitable paths in software.

Who it is forA vulnerability researcher with a network daemon binary who needs to check whether attacker-controlled input can reach a dangerous call.

The problemManually following callgraph paths from recv, read, fgets, or accept to sinks and checking their arguments takes many separate steps.

The outcomeA ranked list of network-reachable sink call sites, each with an argument classification and a taint path the researcher can review.

What you need first

  • A local clone of the Ablation repository at ~/ablation, as the README's launch step assumes
  • Claude Code or Codex installed and signed in with model access
  • A binary, firmware image, or source repository you are authorized to analyze
  • Familiarity with reverse engineering concepts such as ELF, callgraphs, and taint tracking

Steps

  1. Run cd ~/ablation && claude to start a Claude Code session in the repo.
  2. Run /model claude-sonnet-4-6 inside the session to select the model.
  3. Run /goal reverse engineer [whatever you want], replacing the bracketed text with the goal: find network-reachable sinks in <binary path>.
  4. Ask the agent to run the Network Sink Finder, then the Sink Arg Classifier, on the same binary.
  5. Ask the agent to run Taint Analysis on each reachable sink and list the source-to-sink paths.

Prompt for your agent

In the Ablation repo at ~/ablation, use the Network Sink Finder and Sink Arg Classifier on <binary path>, then trace taint from network sources to each reachable sink. Output a table of sink address, argument class, and taint path. Verify that every listed path has a callgraph edge chain from a recv, read, fgets, or accept call before you report it.

Caveat. The README describes sink finding and taint tracking as supported analyses with architecture-specific implementations, so confirm your binary's architecture is covered before relying on the results.

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