Re: LYNX-DEV http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/refindex.html

[Foteos Macrides]

Klaus Weide <address@hidden> wrote:
>On Wed, 23 Oct 1996, Jarkko Hietaniemi wrote:
>
>> Klaus Weide writes:
>> 
>>  > I am not sure what you are saying here.
>>  > 
>>  > Actually, it seems clear enough, it is just so strange I have to ask:
>>  > 
>>  > Are you really saying that *first* Lynx gives you that "A Fatal error...
>>  > ...Lynx now exiting..." message but then instead of immediately exiting
>>  > it goes on to put garbage on your screen??
>> 
>> Yes, that is exactly what I saw, I still see, and what I think
>> I said... Perhaps I should have stressed the strangeness. First lynx
>> babbles about signal 11 _and_ then it still tries to render something
>> and _then_ it says 'exiting via interrupt 0'.
>
>Well I have no idea why that is.  Other than "if you overwrite the wrong
>part of memory, all kinds of weird things can happen".  Lynx tries to
>do lots of cleanup actions on exit (mostly cleaning up allocated memory -
>yes it _does_ stuff like that :) ) and may get confused there.   

        Security problems always raise the question of how much to say
about it publically before a fix for it is available.  A quicky "fix"
(won't get the page fully rendered as intended) is in the composite.
I don't know if Rob has worked the more elegant fix into the RP development
code set.

        When you can predict how to create a buffer overrun in software
via a network transmission, a clever prankster or malicious invader
could arrange for the software to receive a network transmission which
modifies the stack/registers in a manner which does not simply yield
"strange" things and a crash, but something the prankster thinks is
funny, and might not seem so to the victim, or something the malicious
invader needs for a serious breach of the site's security.

                                Fote

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 Foteos Macrides            Worcester Foundation for Biomedical Research
 address@hidden         222 Maple Avenue, Shrewsbury, MA 01545
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