Solar FTP Server fails to properly handle format strings passed to the USER command. When a specially crafted string containing format specifiers is sent, the server crashes due to a read access violation in the __output_1() function of sfsservice.exe. This results in a denial of service (DoS) condition.
The product uses a function that accepts a format string as an argument, but the format string originates from an external source.
When an attacker can modify an externally-controlled format string, this can lead to buffer overflows, denial of service, or data representation problems. It should be noted that in some circumstances, such as internationalization, the set of format strings is externally controlled by design. If the source of these format strings is trusted (e.g. only contained in library files that are only modifiable by the system administrator), then the external control might not itself pose a vulnerability.