Formalizing Stack Safety as a Security Property

arXiv:2105.00417v4 Announce Type: replace-cross
Abstract: The term stack safety is used to describe a variety of compiler, run-time, and hardware mechanisms for protecting stack memory. Unlike "the heap," the ISA-level stack does not correspond to a single high-level language concept: different compilers use it in different ways to support procedural and functional abstraction mechanisms from a wide range of languages. This protean nature makes it difficult to nail down what it means to correctly enforce stack safety.
We propose a …

abstraction arxiv compiler compilers concept cs.cr cs.pl hardware high isa language memory property protecting run safety security single stack support