root from file table overflows?

[chris () NIRVANA NET (Chris Conner)]

I recently got a call from a user that had tried to log into my system,
gotten a few file table overflows, then tried to log back in, and magically
had root. I am running Slack 3.4, 2.0.33 on a pentium200mmx with 128 megs
of ram, 130 megs of swap, and about 13 gigs of hard drive space. We have
been having some trouble with file table overflows, which I assumed to be
coming from lack of memory (they appeared and disappeared miscellaneously,
so the actual files were not corrupt). I do not have any specific
information or ideas on what actual program was "exploited". At the time of
the incident, there were about 35 copies of BitchX, and about 25 eggdrops
running. I don't really have the option of trying to recreate this problem,
so if someone out there has the resources to try this, please let me know
how it goes.

Chris Conner