zlicenser

Hardware-bound software licensing and leak tracing for commercial binaries, no ring-0 drivers required.

This crate is under development. Crate name reserved in meantime

What is zlicenser?

zlicense is an open-source licensing framework for commercial Rust software. It binds encrypted binaries to individual users via a hardware fingerprint, without requiring kernel-level drivers. Works for Linux, Windows and MacOS, with Tauri GUI interface to generate indentifier key and private encryption key.

Also include a small app launcher and decryption program which aids in launching multiple apps using zliscencer and decrypting the app on the fly.

Core guarantees

• Verified delivery: every binary distributed to a customer is cryptographically linked to that customer's legal identity and hardware profile. If the software misbehaves on hardware that was never part of the agreed configuration, the vendor has a verifiable record.
• Machine-locked execution: software only runs on the exact machine it was licensed for. Even if an adversary clones the hardware identifiers, the per-binary private key embedded in the decryption shim prevents execution elsewhere.
• Traceable leaks: because each distributed binary is uniquely encrypted per licensee, any pirated copy can be traced back to its source.
• Remote revocation: licenses can be revoked remotely if agreed upon by customer and vendor. Upon revocation the binary is rendered inoperational; the customer receives a new binary tied to their updated hardware profile.

How it works (overview)

1. Fingerprinting: the customer's system profile (CPU, GPU, OS, driver versions, and other stable identifiers) is hashed into a unique hardware key.
2. Per-binary encryption: the software vendor encrypts the binary with a key derived from the customer's hardware key and a per-issuance private key.
3. Decryption shim: a lightweight shim bundled with the binary holds the private key. At launch it reconstructs the decryption key from the live hardware fingerprint and decrypts the payload on the fly.
4. License management GUI: a bundled desktop tool lets vendors generate, inspect, and revoke license keys without touching the command line.

Design goals

zlicense is not meant to compete with ring-0 anti-tamper solutions. Its goal is:

• Establish legal and technical traceability between a delivered binary and a named customer.
• Prevent casual sharing or reuse across machines.
• Keep the implementation entirely in user space so it works on Linux, macOS, and Windows without elevated privileges or kernel patches.

Status

License

Apache-2.0: see LICENSE.