A Survey of Protocol Fuzzing
Xiaohan Zhang, Cen Zhang, Xinghua Li, Zhengjie Du, Bing Mao, Yuekang Li, Yaowen Zheng, Yeting Li, Li Pan, Yang Liu, Robert H. Deng
Abstract
Communication protocols form the bedrock of our interconnected world, yet vulnerabilities within their implementations pose significant security threats. Recent developments have seen a surge in fuzzing-based research dedicated to uncovering these vulnerabilities within protocol implementations. However, there still lacks a systematic overview of protocol fuzzing for answering the essential questions such as what the unique challenges are, how existing works solve them, and so on. To bridge this gap, we conducted a comprehensive investigation of related works from both academia and industry. Our study includes a detailed summary of the specific challenges in protocol fuzzing and provides a systematic categorization and overview of existing research efforts. Furthermore, we explore and discuss potential future research directions in protocol fuzzing.