Editing 2700: Account Problems

{{comic
| number    = 2700
| date      = November 18, 2022
| title     = Account Problems
| image     = account_problems_2x.png
| imagesize = 538x272px
| noexpand  = true
| titletext = My password is just every Unicode codepoint concatenated into a single UTF-8 string.
}}
 
==Explanation==
{{incomplete|Created by a VISIBLE ZERO WIDTH SPACE. Please change this comment when editing this page. Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}

[[Cueball]] asks [[Ponytail]] to help him because he can't log in to his account. Having attempted to fix [[:Category:Cueball Computer Problems|Cueball's tech issues]] in the past, Ponytail replies with dread. Cueball promises that "It's a normal problem this time", and Ponytail agrees to look at it. But then Cueball reveals that he has included a {{w|Null character|null string terminator character}} in his password when creating an account and now he can't log in. Ponytail responds in disbelief, and Cueball defends his actions by saying that the instructions said to use special characters.

In computer systems, every {{w|Character (computing)|"character"}} (letter, digit, punctuation, etc.) is represented as an integer. For example the lowercase letter 'a' is represented as the number 97, and the digit '1' is represented as the number 49 (when using the {{w|ASCII}} character encoding). A {{w|String (computer science)|"string"}} refers to a sequence of characters, and can be used to store arbitrary text (for example names, messages, passwords). Strings can be arbitrarily long, so some mechanism must be used to record their length. One approach is to store the length explicitly; this representation is often called a {{w|String_(computer_science)#Length-prefixed|Pascal string}} (after the programming language {{w|Pascal}}, which uses this representation). Another approach is to mark the end of the string using a specific character, usually the {{w|null character}} (which is represented as the number 0); such strings are called {{w|null-terminated string}}s, and are used by the {{w|C (programming language)|C programming language}}. Both approaches have advantages and disadvantages.

A limitation of null-terminated strings is that they cannot be used to represent text containing embedded null characters. This is usually not a problem, because normal text never contains null characters. However, if somehow a null character were to end up in the middle of the string, it would cause problems: any code that uses that string would assume this null character marks the end of the string, so the string would effectively be truncated.

Account registration systems often place requirements on passwords in an attempt to encourage users to pick stronger passwords. For example, they might ask that the password include at least one "special character" (such as <code>!@#$%^&*</code>). Cueball misunderstood this requirement as referring to characters such as the null character (which is more accurately referred to as a {{w|ASCII#Control_characters|control character}}). Cueball managed to type the null character as part of his password somehow (on some systems it is possible to type the null character using {{w|Null_character#Representation|certain keyboard shortcuts}} such as <code>Ctrl</code>+<code>Space</code>, <code>Ctrl</code>+<code>@</code>, or <code>Ctrl</code>+<code>2</code>), but the software running the registration system was poorly written and could not cope with this &ndash; it allowed him to create an account with that password, but then when he tried to log in with the same password the system didn't accept it.

The number of the xkcd comic is 2700. When interpreting this as two concatenated octal numbers \27 + \00 it represents both the {{w|End-of-Transmission-Block_character|ETB}} as well as the null character, both of these characters possibly leading to problems when processed in legacy systems (e.g. mainframe computers). When interpreting 2700 as hexadecimal 0x27 + 0x00 numbers it represents the ' character and the null character - a sequence that could lead to SQL injection when it is placed in unescaped form inside of a SQL command.

It's unclear how that particular situation might arise in real software, but here is a similar situation that can easily happen in practice: Suppose a website's registration form allows the user's new password to have up to 20 characters, but due to a programmer error the login page only accepts passwords with up to 18 characters. If the user picks a medium-length password (say with 12 characters), all is well. But if the user picks a password with 20 characters, they will be able to register but they won't be able to log in (which is what happened to Cueball). Another problem can arise when the password system allows the input of Unicode characters at first, but is later changed to only store UTF-8 passwords: language-specific characters like é or ö are then no longer allowed, locking the user from their account until a new password is set.

The title text describes a different situation, where a person's password is "simply" every Unicode character concatenated into a single string. {{w|Unicode}} is a standard for representing characters from many writing systems, and it has 149,186 characters[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicode#Versions] as at the time of this comic (with new characters being added over time). A password consisting of all of those characters would be extremely long; it would be impractical to type by hand, and would be too long for pretty much all account registration systems. (A "codepoint" is the number assigned to a character, and {{w|UTF-8}} is a common encoding system for representing a Unicode codepoint as a sequence of {{w|byte}}s.)

==Transcript==
:[Cueball carries an open laptop over to Ponytail, holding in in both hands. The screen shows a box filling the screen with some text on lines. Ponytail is sitting in an office chair with her laptop at her desk. She has turned her head away from the computer looking at Cueball's screen.]
:Cueball: Can you help me with my account?
:Ponytail: Oh no.

:[Cueball holds his laptop up in front of Ponytail who has turned the chair so she faces him, with her hands in her lap. Her table is not drawn.]
:Cueball: No no, I promise it's a normal problem this time.
:Ponytail: Okay. Fine. What is it?

:[Cueball holds both hands out palm up towards Ponytail who is sitting with his laptop in her lap typing on it.]
:Cueball: I included a null string terminator as part of my password, and now I can't-
:Ponytail: '''''How?!'''''
:Cueball: They said to use special characters!

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Cueball Computer Problems]]