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| -rw-r--r-- | docs/index.rst | 1 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | docs/limitations.rst | 16 |
2 files changed, 17 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/docs/index.rst b/docs/index.rst index a25f4470..58424bfc 100644 --- a/docs/index.rst +++ b/docs/index.rst @@ -85,6 +85,7 @@ The ``cryptography`` open source project installation development/index security + limitations api-stability doing-a-release changelog diff --git a/docs/limitations.rst b/docs/limitations.rst new file mode 100644 index 00000000..423a55b9 --- /dev/null +++ b/docs/limitations.rst @@ -0,0 +1,16 @@ +Known security limitations +-------------------------- + +Lack of secure memory wiping +============================ + +`Memory wiping`_ is used to protect secret data or key material from attackers +with access to uninitialized memory. This can be either because the attacker +has some kind of local user access or because of other softwares use of +uninitialized memory. + +Python exposes no API for us to implement this reliably and as such most +software in Python is vulnerable to this attack. However we do not currently +believe this to be particularly high risk issue for most users. + +.. _`Memory wiping`: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2013/05/29/10421912.aspx |