Memory Error Exploits in C

In this book we examine a number of vulnerabilities§in C-like languages that can be exploited by§attackers to perform §code injection attacks. Next, we§discuss countermeasures that provide protection§against these kinds §of attacks. This book starts off by presenting a§comprehensive and §structured survey§of vulnerabilities and countermeasures for code§injection in C-like languages. Various§countermeasures make §different trade-offs in terms of§performance, e ectivity, memory cost, compatibility,§etc. This makes it hard to evaluate and compare the§adequacy of proposed countermeasures in a given§context. This survey defines a classification and§evaluation framework, on the basis of which§advantages and §disadvantages of countermeasures can§be assessed. This is followed by an in-depth§discussion of two novel §countermeasures which aim to§better protect against attacks while having only a§negligible impact on performance. The first§countermeasure focuses §on stack-based buffer overflows, while the second§aims at heap-§based buffer§overflows and double frees.§§This book will be of interest to computer scientists§and readers interested in security and operating systems.