Part 6/13:
The problem arose when the system attempted to process the new policy data containing blank or null fields. Due to a programming oversight, the code did not properly handle these empty entries. Specifically, a null pointer dereference occurred.
In programming, pointers are variables that store memory addresses. If a program tries to access memory through a null pointer (which points to nothing), it results in a crash or undesirable behavior. Here, the absence of proper null checks meant that when the software encountered the blank fields, it attempted to use a null pointer, causing the binary to crash in every region where the code ran.