Immersive sensemaking for binary reverse engineering: a survey and synthesis

Binary reverse engineering (RE) is critical for many use cases but is cognitively demanding, suffering from compounded uncertainty and lack of full automation. We survey and synthesize interdisciplinary research in cognitive systems engineering, reverse engineering, and immersive analytics to explore how virtual reality (VR) can be applied to better support human cognition for the binary RE task. We identify relevant work using a hybrid literature review process consisting of targeted database searches and thematic synthesis. Our survey includes relevant work in cognitive/mental models of RE, related cognitive theories (such as embodied cognition and cognitive load), and affordances in VR tied to those theories. We synthesize the survey findings to identify several conceptual threads spanning the three surveyed areas and cluster those threads into three overarching themes: enhancing abductive iteration, augmenting working memory, and supporting information organization. Each of these themes yields a recommended set of affordances in VR to prioritize in system design and future research. Our work bridges cognitive theory with immersive technology, providing a foundation for innovative reverse engineering environments and similar analytical use cases.