I was reading this CVE describing a vulnerability in the implementation of a compression algorithm used in HTTP/2. The summary says:
A HTTP/2 implementation built using any version of the Python HPACK
library between v1.0.0 and v2.2.0 could be targeted for a denial of
service attack, specifically a so-called "HPACK Bomb" attack.
I was extremely disturbed by the word so-called because I know it's used for sarcasm. But it doesn't make sense here so it must have another meaning.
I looked here and found this question: Can we use the phrase "so-called" in its positive sense (or neutral) when refereeing to a widely adopted thing?
All answers agree it's used negatively to indicate something is misleading.
Considering the summary also says the following, it seems to be a pretty accurate name for the exploit:
This can lead to a gigantic compression ratio of 4,096 or better,
meaning that 16kB of data can decompress to 64MB of data on the target
machine.
Therefore what does so-called mean here?
- If it is to signify misleading, what would misleading about the term HPACK Bomb?
- or is it effectively used in a sarcastic manner?
Best Answer
so-called does not necessarily imply sarcasm. It often simply means "as people call it".