IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information
Mitigating Use-After-Free Attacks Using Memory-Reuse-Prohibited Library
Summary :
Recently, there has been an increase in use-after-free (UAF) vulnerabilities, which are exploited using a dangling pointer that refers to a freed memory. In particular, large-scale programs such as browsers often include many dangling pointers, and UAF vulnerabilities are frequently exploited by drive-by download attacks. Various methods to prevent UAF attacks have been proposed. However, only a few methods can effectively prevent UAF attacks during runtime with low overhead. In this paper, we propose HeapRevolver, which is a novel UAF attack-prevention method that delays and randomizes the timing of release of freed memory area by using a memory-reuse-prohibited library, which prohibits a freed memory area from being reused for a certain period. The first condition for reuse is that the total size of the freed memory area is beyond the designated size. The threshold for the conditions of reuse of the freed memory area can be randomized by HeapRevolver. Furthermore, we add a second condition for reuse in which the freed memory area is merged with an adjacent freed memory area before release. Furthermore, HeapRevolver can be applied without modifying the target programs. In this paper, we describe the design and implementation of HeapRevolver in Linux and Windows, and report its evaluation results. The results show that HeapRevolver can prevent attacks that exploit existing UAF vulnerabilities. In addition, the overhead is small.
- Publication
- IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information Vol.E100-D No.10 pp.2295-2306
- Publication Date
- 2017/10/01
- Publicized
- 2017/07/21
- Online ISSN
- 1745-1361
- DOI
- 10.1587/transinf.2016INP0020
- Type of Manuscript
- Special Section PAPER (Special Section on Security, Privacy and Anonymity in Computation, Communication and Storage Systems)
- Category
- Operating system and network Security
Authors
Toshihiro YAMAUCHI
Okayama University
Yuta IKEGAMI
Okayama University
Yuya BAN
Okayama University
Keyword
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Toshihiro YAMAUCHI, Yuta IKEGAMI, Yuya BAN, "Mitigating Use-After-Free Attacks Using Memory-Reuse-Prohibited Library" in IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information,
vol. E100-D, no. 10, pp. 2295-2306, October 2017, doi: 10.1587/transinf.2016INP0020.
Abstract: Recently, there has been an increase in use-after-free (UAF) vulnerabilities, which are exploited using a dangling pointer that refers to a freed memory. In particular, large-scale programs such as browsers often include many dangling pointers, and UAF vulnerabilities are frequently exploited by drive-by download attacks. Various methods to prevent UAF attacks have been proposed. However, only a few methods can effectively prevent UAF attacks during runtime with low overhead. In this paper, we propose HeapRevolver, which is a novel UAF attack-prevention method that delays and randomizes the timing of release of freed memory area by using a memory-reuse-prohibited library, which prohibits a freed memory area from being reused for a certain period. The first condition for reuse is that the total size of the freed memory area is beyond the designated size. The threshold for the conditions of reuse of the freed memory area can be randomized by HeapRevolver. Furthermore, we add a second condition for reuse in which the freed memory area is merged with an adjacent freed memory area before release. Furthermore, HeapRevolver can be applied without modifying the target programs. In this paper, we describe the design and implementation of HeapRevolver in Linux and Windows, and report its evaluation results. The results show that HeapRevolver can prevent attacks that exploit existing UAF vulnerabilities. In addition, the overhead is small.
URL: https://global.ieice.org/en_transactions/information/10.1587/transinf.2016INP0020/_p
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@ARTICLE{e100-d_10_2295,
author={Toshihiro YAMAUCHI, Yuta IKEGAMI, Yuya BAN, },
journal={IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information},
title={Mitigating Use-After-Free Attacks Using Memory-Reuse-Prohibited Library},
year={2017},
volume={E100-D},
number={10},
pages={2295-2306},
abstract={Recently, there has been an increase in use-after-free (UAF) vulnerabilities, which are exploited using a dangling pointer that refers to a freed memory. In particular, large-scale programs such as browsers often include many dangling pointers, and UAF vulnerabilities are frequently exploited by drive-by download attacks. Various methods to prevent UAF attacks have been proposed. However, only a few methods can effectively prevent UAF attacks during runtime with low overhead. In this paper, we propose HeapRevolver, which is a novel UAF attack-prevention method that delays and randomizes the timing of release of freed memory area by using a memory-reuse-prohibited library, which prohibits a freed memory area from being reused for a certain period. The first condition for reuse is that the total size of the freed memory area is beyond the designated size. The threshold for the conditions of reuse of the freed memory area can be randomized by HeapRevolver. Furthermore, we add a second condition for reuse in which the freed memory area is merged with an adjacent freed memory area before release. Furthermore, HeapRevolver can be applied without modifying the target programs. In this paper, we describe the design and implementation of HeapRevolver in Linux and Windows, and report its evaluation results. The results show that HeapRevolver can prevent attacks that exploit existing UAF vulnerabilities. In addition, the overhead is small.},
keywords={},
doi={10.1587/transinf.2016INP0020},
ISSN={1745-1361},
month={October},}
Copy
TY - JOUR
TI - Mitigating Use-After-Free Attacks Using Memory-Reuse-Prohibited Library
T2 - IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information
SP - 2295
EP - 2306
AU - Toshihiro YAMAUCHI
AU - Yuta IKEGAMI
AU - Yuya BAN
PY - 2017
DO - 10.1587/transinf.2016INP0020
JO - IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information
SN - 1745-1361
VL - E100-D
IS - 10
JA - IEICE TRANSACTIONS on Information
Y1 - October 2017
AB - Recently, there has been an increase in use-after-free (UAF) vulnerabilities, which are exploited using a dangling pointer that refers to a freed memory. In particular, large-scale programs such as browsers often include many dangling pointers, and UAF vulnerabilities are frequently exploited by drive-by download attacks. Various methods to prevent UAF attacks have been proposed. However, only a few methods can effectively prevent UAF attacks during runtime with low overhead. In this paper, we propose HeapRevolver, which is a novel UAF attack-prevention method that delays and randomizes the timing of release of freed memory area by using a memory-reuse-prohibited library, which prohibits a freed memory area from being reused for a certain period. The first condition for reuse is that the total size of the freed memory area is beyond the designated size. The threshold for the conditions of reuse of the freed memory area can be randomized by HeapRevolver. Furthermore, we add a second condition for reuse in which the freed memory area is merged with an adjacent freed memory area before release. Furthermore, HeapRevolver can be applied without modifying the target programs. In this paper, we describe the design and implementation of HeapRevolver in Linux and Windows, and report its evaluation results. The results show that HeapRevolver can prevent attacks that exploit existing UAF vulnerabilities. In addition, the overhead is small.
ER -
English
