oss-sec mailing list archives
Re: libxslt math.random issue
From: Hanno Böck <hanno () hboeck de>
Date: Thu, 6 Apr 2017 10:32:45 +0200
Hi, On Thu, 6 Apr 2017 07:44:00 +0200 Marcus Meissner <meissner () suse de> wrote:
CVE-2015-9019 has been assigned to use of libexslt (in libxslt) usage of "math.random" without initializing the randomseed. https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=758400 https://bugzilla.suse.com/show_bug.cgi?id=934119
I have some questions and comments: 1. What's the use of the random number and what's the security impact if it's not random? That's not explained In case of the bugreport. In case a cryptographically secure random number is required then using rand()/srand() is a bad idea anyway. (Unfortunately there's no secure random in the standard libc, but at least glibc now has getrandom.). 2. This part of the patch looks a bit strange: + seed = time(NULL); /* just in case /dev/urandom is not there */ + if (fd == -1) { + read (fd, &seed, sizeof(seed)); + close (fd); + } You're calling time() unconditionally, although it's kinda just a fallback. Why not + if (fd == -1) { + read (fd, &seed, sizeof(seed)); + close (fd); + } else { + seed = time(NULL); + } ? (obviously using time is not a secure way to do random numbers, if secure numbers are required cross-plattform you need to do this otherwise anyway) -- Hanno Böck https://hboeck.de/ mail/jabber: hanno () hboeck de GPG: FE73757FA60E4E21B937579FA5880072BBB51E42
Current thread:
- libxslt math.random issue Marcus Meissner (Apr 05)
- Re: libxslt math.random issue Florian Weimer (Apr 05)
- Message not available
- Re: libxslt math.random issue Frank Ch. Eigler (Apr 07)
- Re: Re: libxslt math.random issue Florian Weimer (Apr 07)
- Message not available
- Re: libxslt math.random issue Florian Weimer (Apr 05)
- Re: libxslt math.random issue Hanno Böck (Apr 06)
- Re: libxslt math.random issue Marcus Meissner (Apr 06)