Undefined behavior when:
"The fsetpos function is called to set a position that was not returned by a previous
successful call to the fgetpos function on a stream associated with the same file"
(7.19.9.3).

By using an integer j instead of fpos_t returned from a call to fgetpos,  fsetpos will go to the  ith character in the stream. However, on other implementations or systems this call may crash or move the next read to a random location within the file. 

Non-Compliant Code Example

#include <stdio.h>
int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{
  FILE *info = fopen( "widget.txt", "r");
  int a,b,c;
  if(info == NULL)
  {
    perror("Could not open file");
    return 0;
  }

  if(fscanf(info,"%i %i %i", &a, &b, &c)!=3)
  {
    fprintf(stderr, "Expected but did not find three integers \n");
    fclose(info);
    return 0;
  }
  else
  {
    printf("abc is %i%i%i\n",a,b,c);
  }
  int j=0;
  if(fsetpos(info, &j)!=0)
  {
    perror("fsetpos failed");
    fclose(info);
    return 0;
  }

  if(fscanf(info,"%i %i %i", &a, &b, &c)!=3)
  {
    fprintf(stderr, "Expected but did not find %i %i %i \n");
  }
  else
  {
    printf("abc is %i%i%i \n",a,b,c);
  }

 fclose(info);
 return 0;
}

}

Compliant Solution

int main(int argc, char argv[])
{
  FILE \*info = fopen( "widget.txt", "r");
  fpos_t pos;
  int a,b,c;
  if(info == NULL)
  {
      perror("Could not open file");
      return 0;
  }
  if(fgetpos(info, &pos)\!=0)
  {
    perror("fgetpos failed");
    fclose(info);
    return 0;
  }
 if(fscanf(info,"%i %i %i", &a, &b, &c)\!=3)
 {
   fprintf(stderr, "Expected but did not find three integers \n");
   fclose(info);
   return 0;
 }
 else
 {
   printf("abc is %i%i%i\n",a,b,c);
 }

if(fsetpos(info, &pos)\!=0)
{
  perror("fsetpos failed");
  fclose(info);
  return 0;
}

if(fscanf(info,"%i %i %i", &a, &b, &c)\!=3)
{
  fprintf(stderr, "Expected but did not find %i %i %i \n");
}
else
{
  printf("abc is %i%i%i \n",a,b,c);
}

fclose(info);
return 0;
}

Risk Assessment

The misuse of fsetpos could move a file stream read to a undesired location in the file. If this location held input from user the user would then

gain control of the variables being read from the file. (7.19.9.3).

Rule

Severity

Likelihood

Remediation Cost

Priority

Level

DRAFT

2 (medium)

1(low)

1(low)

P2

L3

References

ISO/IEC 9899 (7.19.9.3)