QFuzz: quantitative fuzzing for side channels
Yannic Noller, Saeid Tizpaz-Niari
Abstract
Side channels pose a significant threat to the confidentiality of software systems. Such vulnerabilities are challenging to detect and evaluate because they arise from non-functional properties of software such as execution times and require reasoning on multiple execution traces. Recently, noninterference notions have been adapted in static analysis, symbolic execution, and greybox fuzzing techniques. However, noninterference is a strict notion and may reject security even if the strength of information leaks are weak. A quantitative notion of security allows for the relaxation of noninterference and tolerates small (unavoidable) leaks. Despite progress in recent years, the existing quantitative approaches have scalability limitations in practice.