CVE-2019-20063

Vulnerability

In libmysofa versions before 0.8, the function hdf/dataobject.c contains a vulnerability where memory is used before being properly initialized. This uninitialized read can be demonstrated using the mysofa2json utility. The issue was present in the codebase up to commit 3dba53f and was resolved in the v0.8 release [1][2].

Exploitation

An attacker can trigger the uninitialized memory read by providing a crafted input file to the mysofa2json tool. No special privileges or authentication are required; the attacker only needs to supply a malicious file that will be processed by the tool. The bug was found via fuzzing, and a proof-of-concept input exists [2].

Impact

Successful exploitation leads to reading uninitialized memory, which could potentially leak sensitive information from the process's address space. The output of mysofa2json may contain this uninitialized data, leading to an information disclosure [1][2].

Mitigation

The vulnerability is fixed in libmysofa version 0.8 and later. Users should upgrade to at least v0.8 to mitigate the issue [1]. No workarounds are available for earlier versions.