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Multiple Buffer Overflow Vulnerabilities in Informix



NGSSoftware Insight Security Research Advisory

Name: Multiple Buffer Overflow Vulnerabilities in Informix
Systems Affected: All versions of Informix
Severity: High
Vendor URL: http://www.ibm.com/
Author: David Litchfield [ davidl@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ]
Date of Public Advisory: 2nd August 2006
Advisory number: #NISR02082006D
CVEID: http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2006-3857
Advisory URL: http://www.ngssoftware.com/research/

Description
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Informix Dynamic Server is a database developed by IBM. During a security assessment of Informix multiple buffer overflow vulnerabilities were discovered that could be exploited via SQL or the protocol.


Details
*******

At the SQL level the following SQL statements are vulnerable to overflow.

SET DEBUG FILE
IFX_FILE_TO_FILE
FILETOCLOB
LOTOFILE
DBINFO


At the protocol level, overflows were found in the following C functions

_sq_remview
_sq_remproc
_sq_remperms
_sq_distfetch
_sq_dcatalog

Each of these call the getname() function. The getname() function takes a source string and copies it to a destination buffer - much like strcpy().

Each of these overflows are trivially exploitable. All have been assigned to CVE-2006-3857.

Further to these overflows, unhandled exceptions can be triggered with a NULL pointer in the _sq_scroll and _sq_bbind functions at the protocol level. Exploitation of these two flaws would result in a DoS condition. These two issues have been assigned to CVE-2006-3856.

Fix Information
***************
IBM was alerted to these flaws between the 6th and the 18th January 2005. Patches have now been made available.

NGSSQuirreL for Informix, an advanced vulnerability assessment scanner designed specifically for Informix, can be used to accurately determine whether your servers are vulnerable to this flaw. More information about NGSSQuirreL for Informix can be found here http://www.ngssoftware.com/products/database-security/ngs-squirrel-informix.php

About NGSSoftware
*****************

NGSSoftware develops vulnerability assessment and compliancy tools for database servers including Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, DB2, Sybase and Informix. Headquartered in the United Kingdom NGS has offices in London, St. Andrews (UK), Sydney, Brisbane, and Perth (Australia) and Texas in the United States; NGSConsulting provide services to some of the largest and most demanding organizations around the globe.

http://www.ngssoftware.com/

Telephone +44 208 401 0070
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