8.1. Call Only Safe Library Routines

Sometimes there is a conflict between security and the development principles of abstraction (information hiding) and reuse. The problem is that some high-level library routines may or may not be implemented securely, and their specifications won't tell you. Even if a particular implementation is secure, it may not be possible to ensure that other versions of the routine will be safe, or that the same interface will be safe on other platforms.

In the end, if your application must be secure, you must sometimes re-implement your own versions of library routines. Basically, you have to re-implement routines if you can't be sure that the library routines will perform the necessary actions you require for security. Yes, in some cases the library's implementation should be fixed, but it's your users who will be hurt if you choose a library routine that is a security weakness. If can, try to use the high-level interfaces when you must re-implement something - that way, you can switch to the high-level interface on systems where its use is secure.

If you can, test to see if the routine is secure or not, and use it if it's secure - ideally you can perform this test as part of compilation or installation (e.g., as part of an ``autoconf'' script). For some conditions this kind of run-time testing is impractical, but for other conditions, this can eliminate many problems. If you don't want to bother to re-implement the library, at least test to make sure it's safe and halt installation if it isn't. That way, users will not accidentally install an insecure program and will know what the problem is.