didn t we just have a discussion on fork how hard it is nowadays to write something that s not buffer overflow protected URL location URL im client vulnerable to attack im client vulnerable to attack james pearce zdnet australia users of messenger client trillian are vulnerable to attack according to information security analyst john hennessy hennessy has published a proof of concept showing the latest version of trillian vNUMBER NUMBER is vulnerable to a buffer overflow attack that will allow individuals with malicious intent to run any program on the computer trillion is a piece of software that allows you to connect to icq aol instant messenger msn messenger yahoo messenger and irc with a single interface despite some companies actively avoiding messenger interoperability according to jason ross senior analyst at amr interactive in june NUMBER there were NUMBER NUMBER home users of trillian in australia about NUMBER NUMBER percent of the internet population and NUMBER NUMBER people using it at work about NUMBER NUMBER percent of the internet population david banes regional manager of symantec security response told zdnet australia the code appeared to be valid with these sort of things you have to find some process that would accept a connection then throw loads of random data at it and get it to crash he said once it s crashed you can try to find a way to exploit it he said the proof of concept that was published is designed to run on notepad but could be easily modified to run any program on the system he said the problem was easy to fix by writing protective code around that particular piece to more closely validate the data around that piece because people are pushed for productivity you tend to leave out the checks and balances you should put in which is why we have all these buffer overflows and exploits out there now said banes cerulean studios creator of trillian was contacted for comment but had not responded by the time of publication for all security related news including updates on the latest viruses hacking exploits and patches check out zdnet uk s security news section have your say instantly and see what others have said go to the security forum let the editors know what you think in the mailroom copyright NUMBER cnet networks inc all rights reserved zdnet is a registered service mark of cnet networks inc zdnet logo is a service mark of cnet networks inc URL 