Chapter 4: Introduction to Format String Bugs

Overview

This chapter focuses on format string bugs in Linux, although they are not operating systemspecific. In their most common form, format string bugs are a result of facilities for handling functions with variable arguments in the C programming language. Since it's really C that makes format string bugs possible, they affect every OS that has a C compiler, which is to say, almost every OS in existence.

For a discussion of precisely why format string bugs exist at all, see the "Why Did This Happen?" section at the end of this chapter.