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Stack Canary | Training Camp
Global Accelerated Learning • Est. 1999
Glossary Term Stack Canary

Training Camp • Cybersecurity Glossary

What is Stack Canary?

A stack canary is a security mechanism that helps prevent buffer overflow attacks by placing a random value before the function's return address on the stack to detect and prevent overwrite attempts.

Glossary > Stack Canary

Understanding Stack Canary

Stack Canary is a security mechanism used to protect software from buffer overflow attacks. It involves inserting a random value (canary) before the return address on the stack. During program execution, the system checks if this canary value remains intact. If a buffer overflow occurs, the canary value is likely to change, triggering an alert or terminating the program to prevent the exploitation of memory corruption vulnerabilities.

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