Black Hat Rust: Applied Hacking Programming in Rust

Introduction

The book "Black Hat Rust: Applied Hacking Programming in Rust" (original title Black Hat Rust) by Sylvain Kerkour was published in 2022 and instantly attracted the attention of the Rust developer community and information security professionals. This is not another language tutorial — it is a practical guide to creating tools for offensive security (pentesting, reverse engineering, writing exploits) using the capabilities of Rust: performance, memory safety, and zero-cost abstractions.

The book, about 400 pages long, is aimed at readers already familiar with the basics of Rust but wanting to apply it in the field of cybersecurity. The author is an experienced developer and security researcher, so the material is rich with real-world examples and techniques used in modern attacks.

What the Book is About

"Black Hat Rust" does not teach the basics of programming — it teaches you to think like an attacker and implement attacking tools in Rust. The book covers the full cycle of creating malware and pentesting tools: from reconnaissance and scanning to vulnerability exploitation and post-exploitation.

Main topics:

• Network scanning and reconnaissance — writing fast port scanners, sniffers, information gathering tools.
• Vulnerability exploitation — creating exploits for buffer overflows, format strings, heap vulnerabilities.
• Web attacks — tools for SQL injection, XSS, CSRF, automating attacks on web applications.
• Cryptography — implementing attacks on cryptographic protocols (padding oracle, timing attacks).
• Post-exploitation — writing backdoors, rootkits, ransomware in Rust.
• Obfuscation and anti-detection — methods of hiding code from antivirus and EDR.

Each chapter contains code that can be immediately run and modified. The author uses only the Rust standard library and a minimal number of external crates so the reader can understand the mechanisms more deeply.

Who This Book is For

The book is intended for:

• Rust developers looking to move into security or create high-performance pentesting tools.
• Information security professionals (pentesters, reverse engineers) who want to learn Rust as an alternative to C/C++/Python for writing exploits.
• Students and researchers interested in low-level programming and attacking techniques.

Important: the book is not for programming beginners. A solid knowledge of Rust (proficiency with borrowing, lifetimes, types, macros) and a basic understanding of x86/x64 architecture, process memory, and network protocols are required.

What the Reader Will Learn

After reading the book, the reader will be able to:

• Write high-performance port scanners and sniffers in Rust.
• Create exploits for classic vulnerabilities (buffer overflow, use-after-free, integer overflow).
• Implement attacks on web applications using their own tools.
• Use Rust for cryptanalysis and implementing side-channel attacks.
• Write backdoors and rootkits resistant to detection.
• Obfuscate code and bypass antivirus engines.
• Understand the internal workings of operating systems and the Rust compiler from an attacker's perspective.

Strengths

1. Practical focus: each technique is accompanied by complete code that can be compiled and run. No abstract theories — only what works.

2. Modernity: the book uses the Rust 2021 edition and current versions of crates. Examples work on Windows, Linux, and macOS.

3. Depth: the author does not