Checkbochs: Use Hardware to Check Software
Sorav Bansal

TL;DR
Checkbochs is a hardware-level machine simulator that verifies OS and application properties through plugins, uncovering new bugs in Linux distributions and educational software.
Contribution
It introduces a hardware-level simulation system with plugin-based property checks, enabling detection of security and correctness bugs not previously identified.
Findings
Discovered unknown bugs in Linux distributions
Uncovered numerous bugs in undergraduate coursework
Validated effectiveness of hardware-level checks
Abstract
In this paper, we present a system called Checkbochs, a machine simulator that checks rules about its guest operating system and applications at the hardware level. The properties to be checked can be implemented as `plugins' in the Checkbochs simulator. Some of the properties that were checked using Checkbochs include null-pointer checks, format-string vulnerabilities, user/kernel pointer checks, and race-conditions. On implementing these checks, we were able to uncover previously-unknown bugs in widely used Linux distributions. We also tested our tools on undergraduate coursework, and found numerous bugs.
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Taxonomy
TopicsSecurity and Verification in Computing · Parallel Computing and Optimization Techniques · Advanced Data Storage Technologies
