Which term describes techniques that ensure the program is not running under the debugger?

• A. Anti-emulation
• B. Anti-heuristics
• C. Add-on viruses
• D. Anti-debugging

Answer: (D)

Anti-debugging is the term for techniques that detect if a program is running under a debugger and respond by altering behavior or stopping execution. This helps protect software from easier reverse engineering or thorough inspection by analysts. In practice, programs might check for debugger presence using system APIs, inspect process flags like BeingDebugged, or rely on timing or exception-handling tricks to reveal whether a debugger is attached. The other options don’t fit as precisely: anti-emulation would target running in virtualized or emulated environments, not specifically debuggers; anti-heuristics is not a standard, well-defined term for debugger detection; add-on viruses describe other malware concepts unrelated to debugger awareness.