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Bugtraq archives for 4th quarter (Oct-Dec) 1994: access(2)--a security hole?

access(2)--a security hole?

Jonathan M. Bresler (jmbkryten.Atinc.COM)
Thu, 20 Oct 1994 21:41:48 -0400 (EDT) 

the FreeBSD man page for access(2) includes a section titled "CAVEAT" 
which says that "Access() is a potential security hole and should never 
be used."

i looked into libc source and access is a typical system call--no real 
source at all, just enough assembler wrapper to generate a system call 
with the correct arguments.  the assembler is generated when libc is 
compiled through defines and other macros--real slick.

the actual syscall is executed in /sys/kern/vfs_syscalls.c, but i cant 
see why this is a hole.

can you enlighten me?

jmb 

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