Stack smashing is a buffer overflow vulnerability which is characterized by writing data outside the size of a stack-allocated buffer, causing corruption of a neighboring stack frame and potentially permitting execution of malicious code. Use this tag for questions about `stack smashing detected` and similar runtime errors, code with vulnerable buffers and other security risks related to stack smashing. See also: [buffer-overflow] and [buffer-overrun].
In software, a stack buffer overflow (also known as stack smashing) occurs when a program writes to a memory address on the program's call stack outside of the intended data structure, which is usually a fixed length buffer. Stack buffer overflow bugs are caused when a program writes more data to a buffer located on the stack than what is actually allocated for that buffer. This almost always results in corruption of adjacent data on the stack, and in cases where the overflow was triggered by mistake, will often cause the program to crash or operate incorrectly. Stack buffer overflow is a type of the more general programming malfunction known as buffer overflow (or buffer overrun).
This tag should be used for questions about stack smashing detected and similar runtime errors, code with vulnerable buffers and other security risks related to stack smashing. See also: buffer-overflow and buffer-overrun.
