CVE-2017-17052: Use After Free (CWE-416)
value: The mm_init function in kernel/fork.c in the Linux kernel before 4.12.10 does not clear the ->exe_file member of a new process's mm_struct, allowing a local attacker to achieve a use-after-free or possibly have unspecified other impact by running a specially crafted program.
CWE description: The product reuses or references memory after it has been freed. At some point afterward, the memory may be allocated again and saved in another pointer, while the original pointer references a location somewhere within the new allocation. Any operations using the original pointer are no longer valid because the memory "belongs" to the code that operates on the new pointer.
CVSS v3 base score: 7.8
Published: 2017-11-29T03:29Z
Repository: https://github.com/torvalds/linux
Language: C
Files changed: kernel/fork.c
Commit date: 2017-08-25 16:12:46 -0700
Commit message: fork: fix incorrect fput of ->exe_file causing use-after-free

Commit 7c051267931a ("mm, fork: make dup_mmap wait for mmap_sem for
write killable") made it possible to kill a forking task while it is
waiting to acquire its ->mmap_sem for write, in dup_mmap().

However, it was overlooked that this introduced an new error path before
a reference is taken on the mm_struct's ->exe_file.  Since the
->exe_file of the new mm_struct was already set to the old ->exe_file by
the memcpy() in dup_mm(), it was possible for the mmput() in the error
path of dup_mm() to drop a reference to ->exe_file which was never
taken.

This caused the struct file to later be freed prematurely.

Fix it by updating mm_init() to NULL out the ->exe_file, in the same
place it clears other things like the list of mmaps.

This bug was found by syzkaller.  It can be reproduced using the
following C program:

    #define _GNU_SOURCE
    #include <pthread.h>
    #include <stdlib.h>
    #include <sys/mman.h>
    #include <sys/syscall.h>
    #include <sys/wait.h>
    #include <unistd.h>

    static void *mmap_thread(void *_arg)
    {
        for (;;) {
            mmap(NULL, 0x1000000, PROT_READ,
                 MAP_POPULATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS|MAP_PRIVATE, -1, 0);
        }
    }

    static void *fork_thread(void *_arg)
    {
        usleep(rand() % 10000);
        fork();
    }

    int main(void)
    {
        fork();
        fork();
        fork();
        for (;;) {
            if (fork() == 0) {
                pthread_t t;

                pthread_create(&t, NULL, mmap_thread, NULL);
                pthread_create(&t, NULL, fork_thread, NULL);
                usleep(rand() % 10000);
                syscall(__NR_exit_group, 0);
            }
            wait(NULL);
        }
    }

No special kernel config options are needed.  It usually causes a NULL
pointer dereference in __remove_shared_vm_struct() during exit, or in
dup_mmap() (which is usually inlined into copy_process()) during fork.
Both are due to a vm_area_struct's ->vm_file being used after it's
already been freed.

Google Bug Id: 64772007

Link: http://lkml.kernel.org/r/20170823211408.31198-1-ebiggers3@gmail.com
Fixes: 7c051267931a ("mm, fork: make dup_mmap wait for mmap_sem for write killable")
Signed-off-by: Eric Biggers <ebiggers@google.com>
Tested-by: Mark Rutland <mark.rutland@arm.com>
Acked-by: Michal Hocko <mhocko@suse.com>
Cc: Dmitry Vyukov <dvyukov@google.com>
Cc: Ingo Molnar <mingo@kernel.org>
Cc: Konstantin Khlebnikov <koct9i@gmail.com>
Cc: Oleg Nesterov <oleg@redhat.com>
Cc: Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org>
Cc: Vlastimil Babka <vbabka@suse.cz>
Cc: <stable@vger.kernel.org>	[v4.7+]
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>

Diff: diff --git a/kernel/fork.c b/kernel/fork.c
index e075b7780421de..cbbea277b3fba7 100644
--- a/kernel/fork.c
+++ b/kernel/fork.c
@@ -804,10 +804,11 @@ static struct mm_struct *mm_init(struct mm_struct *mm, struct task_struct *p,
 	memset(&mm->rss_stat, 0, sizeof(mm->rss_stat));
 	spin_lock_init(&mm->page_table_lock);
 	mm_init_cpumask(mm);
 	mm_init_aio(mm);
 	mm_init_owner(mm, p);
+	RCU_INIT_POINTER(mm->exe_file, NULL);
 	mmu_notifier_mm_init(mm);
 	init_tlb_flush_pending(mm);
 #if defined(CONFIG_TRANSPARENT_HUGEPAGE) && !USE_SPLIT_PMD_PTLOCKS
 	mm->pmd_huge_pte = NULL;
 #endif

Fixed code: 	RCU_INIT_POINTER(mm->exe_file, NULL);