The integrated ICMP service of the network stack of affected devices can be forced to exhaust its available memory resources when receiving specially crafted messages targeting IP fragment re-assembly. This could allow an unauthenticated remote attacker to cause a temporary denial of service condition of the ICMP service, other communication services are not affected. Affected devices will resume normal operation after the attack terminates.
The product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource.
Mitigation of resource exhaustion attacks requires that the target system either:
The first of these solutions is an issue in itself though, since it may allow attackers to prevent the use of the system by a particular valid user. If the attacker impersonates the valid user, they may be able to prevent the user from accessing the server in question.
The second solution is simply difficult to effectively institute – and even when properly done, it does not provide a full solution. It simply makes the attack require more resources on the part of the attacker.