What is hidden under the specialty of reverse engineering (Reverse engineering)?

Question

reverse engineering

I would like to get some general ( live ) information about this specialty and the experience of people who are directly related to it.

1. First, I would like to hear some of the brightest stories from the practice of reversers. What plunged you headlong into solving the problem and after that you felt pride in the work done (or oppression for the unfinished =)).
   
2. How much is in demand (vacancies in the market, facing tasks at work) reverse executable files under Linux?
   
3. How many utilities do you use in the analysis process and how thoroughly do you need to master them? (e.g. IDA Pro , OllyDBG (in which cases it is convenient to use one or the other); peid , hexeditor , ...)
   
4. As I understand it, the reverse skill is tied to a specific operating system (correct me if this is not the case), because. you need to know how the OS works ; its API ; knowledge of analysis tools that are unique to her; etc.. Therefore, is there a clear division that this specialist only works with Android , the other with Windows, the third #OTHER_OS? If not, how many specialists can work with multiple (2-3) operating systems ?
   
5. How often do you encounter " dead end " situations? Those. when one person realizes that they are unable to do the job and the help of colleagues is required. How is the process of " collective " reverse?
   
6. What are the main tasks set before the reverser? As I understand it, for example, for a malicious file, reverse means to detect malicious code, understand how it works, assess the level of threat, detail the signature, after which it can be added to the database. For crackers, it's to understand how protection works, to find a bottleneck in the code that can be patched to disable license checking and make the program " free ".
   
7. Assembly language . If I understand correctly, then it is the difference between the architecture of the processor and the OS . In addition, there are various notations. To be honest, I don’t even know how to formulate the question for this paragraph, I probably just want to hear about the problems of reading code when reversing files for different architectures / OS .
   
8. Reversers that work with firmware and rare hardware (for example, some kind of board from a nuclear power plant or a production machine) is it some kind of special caste ? What is their starting point, if, for example, at the initial stage there is neither documentation on the architecture of iron, nor a description of the syntax of the language.
   

PS Perhaps some of the questions are worded incorrectly ( lamerish ) - in that case, sorry, and let's just concretize it together, after which I will update the question so that it becomes clear and the answer to it was pleasant to read.
PSS If you do not want to answer all questions, answer the one on which you have something to tell =)

Answer 1

You are too romantic.
Reversed already a hundred times in my life.
I am the most ordinary programmer and administrator. But sometimes it is very necessary to put the "black box" into operation or restore (which is more often).
I'd say it's an ordinary job.
What you mean is a very small part of reverse engineering. Vanishingly small.
I was so dabbled in school - I put endless lives in games.

Answer 2

On the first question - a blog of any AV company to help. By software, you forgot about HIEW

Answer 3

Now reversers for mobile platforms are probably in demand ... And tools like decompilers

Answer 4

It seems to me that you are looking a little in the wrong direction, examples of reverse engineering are wine, ReactOS, pirated WoW servers, i.e. software that works the same without using the original code. Security hacking is not a reverse, it is a backtrace and hacking, introducing your own code into someone else's.

Answer 5

So no one clearly answered the questions, but I would very much like to read! I'm sorry, I'm very curious...