CVE-2016-6888 - Integer Overflow or Wraparound

Severity

21%

Complexity

39%

Confidentiality

48%

Integer overflow in the net_tx_pkt_init function in hw/net/net_tx_pkt.c in QEMU (aka Quick Emulator) allows local guest OS administrators to cause a denial of service (QEMU process crash) via the maximum fragmentation count, which triggers an unchecked multiplication and NULL pointer dereference.

Integer overflow in the net_tx_pkt_init function in hw/net/net_tx_pkt.c in QEMU (aka Quick Emulator) allows local guest OS administrators to cause a denial of service (QEMU process crash) via the maximum fragmentation count, which triggers an unchecked multiplication and NULL pointer dereference.

CVSS 3.0 Base Score 4.4. CVSS Attack Vector: local. CVSS Attack Complexity: low. CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H).

CVSS 2.0 Base Score 2.1. CVSS Attack Vector: local. CVSS Attack Complexity: low. CVSS Vector: (AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P).

Demo Examples

Integer Overflow or Wraparound

CWE-190

The following image processing code allocates a table for images.


               
...

This code intends to allocate a table of size num_imgs, however as num_imgs grows large, the calculation determining the size of the list will eventually overflow (CWE-190). This will result in a very small list to be allocated instead. If the subsequent code operates on the list as if it were num_imgs long, it may result in many types of out-of-bounds problems (CWE-119).

Integer Overflow or Wraparound

CWE-190

The following code excerpt from OpenSSH 3.3 demonstrates a classic case of integer overflow:


               
}
for (i = 0; i < nresp; i++) response[i] = packet_get_string(NULL);

If nresp has the value 1073741824 and sizeof(char*) has its typical value of 4, then the result of the operation nresp*sizeof(char*) overflows, and the argument to xmalloc() will be 0. Most malloc() implementations will happily allocate a 0-byte buffer, causing the subsequent loop iterations to overflow the heap buffer response.

Integer Overflow or Wraparound

CWE-190

Integer overflows can be complicated and difficult to detect. The following example is an attempt to show how an integer overflow may lead to undefined looping behavior:


               
}
bytesRec += getFromInput(buf+bytesRec);

In the above case, it is entirely possible that bytesRec may overflow, continuously creating a lower number than MAXGET and also overwriting the first MAXGET-1 bytes of buf.

Integer Overflow or Wraparound

CWE-190

In this example the method determineFirstQuarterRevenue is used to determine the first quarter revenue for an accounting/business application. The method retrieves the monthly sales totals for the first three months of the year, calculates the first quarter sales totals from the monthly sales totals, calculates the first quarter revenue based on the first quarter sales, and finally saves the first quarter revenue results to the database.


               
}
return 0;// Variable for sales revenue for the quarter// Calculate quarterly total// Calculate the total revenue for the quarter

However, in this example the primitive type short int is used for both the monthly and the quarterly sales variables. In C the short int primitive type has a maximum value of 32768. This creates a potential integer overflow if the value for the three monthly sales adds up to more than the maximum value for the short int primitive type. An integer overflow can lead to data corruption, unexpected behavior, infinite loops and system crashes. To correct the situation the appropriate primitive type should be used, as in the example below, and/or provide some validation mechanism to ensure that the maximum value for the primitive type is not exceeded.


               
}
...// Calculate quarterly total// Calculate the total revenue for the quarter

Note that an integer overflow could also occur if the quarterSold variable has a primitive type long but the method calculateRevenueForQuarter has a parameter of type short.

Demo Examples

NULL Pointer Dereference

CWE-476

While there are no complete fixes aside from conscientious programming, the following steps will go a long way to ensure that NULL pointer dereferences do not occur.


               
}
/* make use of pointer1 *//* ... */

If you are working with a multithreaded or otherwise asynchronous environment, ensure that proper locking APIs are used to lock before the if statement; and unlock when it has finished.

NULL Pointer Dereference

CWE-476

This example takes an IP address from a user, verifies that it is well formed and then looks up the hostname and copies it into a buffer.


               
}
strcpy(hostname, hp->h_name);/*routine that ensures user_supplied_addr is in the right format for conversion */

If an attacker provides an address that appears to be well-formed, but the address does not resolve to a hostname, then the call to gethostbyaddr() will return NULL. Since the code does not check the return value from gethostbyaddr (CWE-252), a NULL pointer dereference would then occur in the call to strcpy().

Note that this example is also vulnerable to a buffer overflow (see CWE-119).

NULL Pointer Dereference

CWE-476

In the following code, the programmer assumes that the system always has a property named "cmd" defined. If an attacker can control the program's environment so that "cmd" is not defined, the program throws a NULL pointer exception when it attempts to call the trim() method.


               
cmd = cmd.trim();

NULL Pointer Dereference

CWE-476

This application has registered to handle a URL when sent an intent:


               
}......
}
}
int length = URL.length();
...

The application assumes the URL will always be included in the intent. When the URL is not present, the call to getStringExtra() will return null, thus causing a null pointer exception when length() is called.

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