[Opengrads-devel] Buffer overflow vulnerability in GrADS

[Arlindo da S. <da...@al...>]

Brian, Jennifer et al,

  As we all know, GrADS makes extensive use of the sprintf() function which
is known to have the so-called buffer overflow vulnerability as explained in
this document:

http://developer.apple.com/mac/library/documentation/Security/Conceptual/SecureCodingGuide/Articles/BufferOverflows.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40002577

  A good precaution would be to replace all occurrences of sprintf() with
snprintf(), making sure the resulting string is NULL terminated.  Since many
occurrences of sprintf() are associated with gaprnt(), it might be
convenient to use the stdarg.h feature in the C standard library

   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stdarg.h

 and have a new function

    gaprntf(int level,  const char *format, ...)

which has the combined effect of sprintf() + gaprnt().

  What do you think? I need to address this vulnerability before being able
to deploy grads server side. I am willing to help implement this change in
the main grads codebase.

  Thanks,

       Arlindo


-- 
Arlindo da Silva
da...@al...