CWE-401
Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime
The product does not sufficiently track and release allocated memory after it has been used, making the memory unavailable for reallocation and reuse.
Mitigation ID: MIT-41
Phase: Implementation
Strategy: Libraries or Frameworks
Description:
- Choose a language or tool that provides automatic memory management, or makes manual memory management less error-prone.
- For example, glibc in Linux provides protection against free of invalid pointers.
- When using Xcode to target OS X or iOS, enable automatic reference counting (ARC) [REF-391].
- To help correctly and consistently manage memory when programming in C++, consider using a smart pointer class such as std::auto_ptr (defined by ISO/IEC ISO/IEC 14882:2003), std::shared_ptr and std::unique_ptr (specified by an upcoming revision of the C++ standard, informally referred to as C++ 1x), or equivalent solutions such as Boost.
Mitigation
Phase: Architecture and Design
Description:
- Use an abstraction library to abstract away risky APIs. Not a complete solution.
Mitigation
Phases: Architecture and Design, Build and Compilation
Description:
- Consider using the Boehm-Demers-Weiser garbage collector (bdwgc), which can help avoid leaks.
No CAPEC attack patterns related to this CWE.