Getting passwords from the heap?

From: Jason Spence (thalakanat_private)
Date: Mon Jun 25 2001 - 13:21:08 PDT

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    Hi -
    
    I was trying to explain to someone why it's important to do a
    memset(3) on newly allocated memory by firing up gdb and doing
    hexdumps of raw uninitialized memory, when I noticed there was what
    looked like privileged information in the hexdump!  
    
    I don't know very much about the specifics of how malloc works, but is
    this a valid method of trying to get privileged information from an
    unprivilieged account?  For example, does memory that root allocates
    then deallocates become available to user processes via malloc(3)?
    
    I'm going to research this some more and put together a report with
    the feedback I get if it turns out that this is a valid method of
    attacking a system from a non-root account.
    
    -- 
     - Jason
    
    MOUNT TAPE U1439 ON B3, NO RING
    



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