The word "free" in front of any technology is always enticing, but even more so in the current economic climate. It's not unusual for security or other technology vendors to toss out the occasional freebie tool, which, of course, they also hope will stimulate interest in their other (price-tagged) products. The latest freebie utility is FuzzOr, an open-source fuzzing tool released today by Sentrigo for detecting potential security flaws in Oracle database applications.

Slavik Markovich, Sentrigo's CTO, says FuzzOr is aimed at database administrators, application developers, and security pros who regularly run tests for security problems -- namely SQL injection and buffer overflow flaws -- in their Oracle 8i (and above) database environments. Specifically, FuzzOr tests PL/SQL code in applications that interact and store data in the Oracle database. It fuzzess the applications' built-in procedures and functions that sit inside the database.

FuzzOr can be run once a week or once a month. Unlike traditional fuzzers, it was designed to be easy to use and without all the configuration steps that fuzzers often entail, according to Markovich. "It's already preconfigured with some attack inputs you want to test," he says.

Not surprisingly, FuzzOr also can be integrated with Sentrigo's Hedgehog line of database security and patching software. And like any savvy vendor, Sentrigo hopes you'll not only download the free fuzzer, but also buy its related products.

-- Kelly Jackson Higgins, Senior Editor, Dark Reading