Weaponizing Unicode: Homographs Beyond IDNs

Most people are familiar with homograph attacks due to phishing or other attack campaigns using Internationalized Domain Names with look-alike characters. But homograph attacks exist against wide variety of systems that have gotten far less attention. This talk discusses the use of homographs to attack machine learning systems, to submit malicious software patches, and to craft cryptographic canary traps and leak repudiation mechanisms. It then introduces a generalized defense strategy that should work against homograph attacks in any context.

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