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arXiv · 2502.13163

A Survey of Fuzzing Open-Source Operating Systems

Kun Hu·Qicai Chen·Wenzhuo Zhang·Zilong Lu·Bihuan Chen·You Lu·Haowen Jiang·Bingkun Sun·Xin Peng·Wenyun Zhao
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Abstract

Vulnerabilities in open-source operating systems (OSs) pose substantial security risks to software systems, making their detection crucial. While fuzzing has been an effective vulnerability detection technique in various domains, OS fuzzing (OSF) faces unique challenges due to OS complexity and multi-layered interaction, and has not been comprehensively reviewed. Therefore, this work systematically surveys the state-of-the-art OSF techniques, categorizes them based on the general fuzzing process, and investigates challenges specific to kernel, file system, driver, and hypervisor fuzzing. Finally, future research directions for OSF are discussed.

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Kun Hu, Qicai Chen, Wenzhuo Zhang, Zilong Lu, Bihuan Chen, You Lu, Haowen Jiang, Bingkun Sun, Xin Peng, Wenyun Zhao. 2025-02-17. A Survey of Fuzzing Open-Source Operating Systems. https://arxiv.org/abs/2502.13163

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