NGSSoftware Insight Security Research Advisory

Name: IBM DB2 to_char and to_date Denial Of Service
Systems Affected: DB2 8.1
Severity: High risk from local
Vendor URL: http://www.ibm.com/
Author: Chris Anley [ chris at ngssoftware.com ]
Relates to: http://www.ngssoftware.com/advisories/db2-02.txt
Date of Public Advisory: 5th January 2005
Advisory number: #NISR05012005G
Advisory URL: http://www.ngssoftware.com/advisories/db205012005G.txt

Description
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IBM DB2 is vulnerable to Denial of Service conditions when processing
certain function calls.

Details
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The numbers below are NGS BUGID reference numbers mentioned in
http://www.ngssoftware.com/advisories/db2-02.txt

112) If the to_char function is called with an empty string for its
second parameter, DB2 dereferences a null pointer and terminates:

select to_char('aaa','') from sysibm.sysdummy1

113) If the to_date function is called with an empty string for its
second parameter, DB2 dereferences a null pointer and terminates:

select to_date('aaa', '') from sysibm.sysdummy1

In both cases, DB2 must be restarted in order to restore normal
functionality.

Fix Information
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IBM has written a patch and can be obtained with the latest fixpak.

http://www-306.ibm.com/software/data/db2/udb/support/downloadv8.html -
DB2 v8.1
http://www-306.ibm.com/software/data/db2/udb/support/downloadv7.html -
DB2 v7.x

NGSSQuirreL for DB2 (http://www.ngssoftware.com/db2.htm) can be used to
assess whether your DB2 server is vulnerable to this.


About NGSSoftware
*****************
NGSSoftware design, research and develop intelligent, advanced
application security assessment scanners. Based in the United Kingdom,
NGSSoftware have offices in the South of London and the East Coast of
Scotland. NGSSoftware's sister company NGSConsulting, offers best of
breed security consulting services, specialising in application, host
and network security assessments.

http://www.ngssoftware.com/

Telephone +44 208 401 0070
Fax +44 208 401 0076

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