CVE-2012-3511 (published 2012-10-04T03:28Z)

Multiple race conditions in the madvise_remove function in mm/madvise.c in the Linux kernel before 3.4.5 allow local users to cause a denial of service (use-after-free and system crash) via vectors involving a (1) munmap or (2) close system call.

Severity: MEDIUM
CVSS v2 base score: 6.2 (AV:L/AC:H/Au:N/C:C/I:C/A:C)

Weakness information:
cwe_id: CWE-362
cwe_name: Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization ('Race Condition')
description: The product contains a code sequence that can run concurrently with other code, and the code sequence requires temporary, exclusive access to a shared resource, but a timing window exists in which the shared resource can be modified by another code sequence that is operating concurrently.
extended_description: 
            This can have security implications when the expected synchronization is in security-critical code, such as recording whether a user is authenticated or modifying important state information that should not be influenced by an outsider.
            A race condition occurs within concurrent environments, and is effectively a property of a code sequence. Depending on the context, a code sequence may be in the form of a function call, a small number of instructions, a series of program invocations, etc.
            A race condition violates these properties, which are closely related:
               
                  Exclusivity - the code sequence is given exclusive access to the shared resource, i.e., no other code sequence can modify properties of the shared resource before the original sequence has completed execution.
                  Atomicity - the code sequence is behaviorally atomic, i.e., no other thread or process can concurrently execute the same sequence of instructions (or a subset) against the same resource.
               
            A race condition exists when an "interfering code sequence" can still access the shared resource, violating exclusivity. Programmers may assume that certain code sequences execute too quickly to be affected by an interfering code sequence; when they are not, this violates atomicity. For example, the single "x++" statement may appear atomic at the code layer, but it is actually non-atomic at the instruction layer, since it involves a read (the original value of x), followed by a computation (x+1), followed by a write (save the result to x).
            The interfering code sequence could be "trusted" or "untrusted." A trusted interfering code sequence occurs within the product; it cannot be modified by the attacker, and it can only be invoked indirectly. An untrusted interfering code sequence can be authored directly by the attacker, and typically it is external to the vulnerable product.
         
         

Fix information:
repo_url: https://github.com/torvalds/linux
commit_details: repo_url: https://github.com/torvalds/linux
author: Andy Lutomirski
author_date: 2012-07-05 16:00:11-07:00
msg: mm: Hold a file reference in madvise_remove

Otherwise the code races with munmap (causing a use-after-free
of the vma) or with close (causing a use-after-free of the struct
file).

The bug was introduced by commit 90ed52ebe481 ("[PATCH] holepunch: fix
mmap_sem i_mutex deadlock")

Cc: Hugh Dickins <hugh@veritas.com>
Cc: Miklos Szeredi <mszeredi@suse.cz>
Cc: Badari Pulavarty <pbadari@us.ibm.com>
Cc: Nick Piggin <npiggin@suse.de>
Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Signed-off-by: Andy Lutomirski <luto@amacapital.net>
Signed-off-by: Linus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>
repository: repo_url: https://github.com/torvalds/linux
repo_name: torvalds/linux
description: Linux kernel source tree
repo_language: C
owner: torvalds
file_changes: filename: madvise.c
change_type: ModificationType.MODIFY
diff: @@ -15,6 +15,7 @@
 #include <linux/sched.h>
 #include <linux/ksm.h>
 #include <linux/fs.h>
+#include <linux/file.h>
 
 /*
  * Any behaviour which results in changes to the vma->vm_flags needs to
@@ -204,14 +205,16 @@ static long madvise_remove(struct vm_area_struct *vma,
 {
 	loff_t offset;
 	int error;
+	struct file *f;
 
 	*prev = NULL;	/* tell sys_madvise we drop mmap_sem */
 
 	if (vma->vm_flags & (VM_LOCKED|VM_NONLINEAR|VM_HUGETLB))
 		return -EINVAL;
 
-	if (!vma->vm_file || !vma->vm_file->f_mapping
-		|| !vma->vm_file->f_mapping->host) {
+	f = vma->vm_file;
+
+	if (!f || !f->f_mapping || !f->f_mapping->host) {
 			return -EINVAL;
 	}
 
@@ -221,11 +224,18 @@ static long madvise_remove(struct vm_area_struct *vma,
 	offset = (loff_t)(start - vma->vm_start)
 			+ ((loff_t)vma->vm_pgoff << PAGE_SHIFT);
 
-	/* filesystem's fallocate may need to take i_mutex */
+	/*
+	 * Filesystem's fallocate may need to take i_mutex.  We need to
+	 * explicitly grab a reference because the vma (and hence the
+	 * vma's reference to the file) can go away as soon as we drop
+	 * mmap_sem.
+	 */
+	get_file(f);
 	up_read(&current->mm->mmap_sem);
-	error = do_fallocate(vma->vm_file,
+	error = do_fallocate(f,
 				FALLOC_FL_PUNCH_HOLE | FALLOC_FL_KEEP_SIZE,
 				offset, end - start);
+	fput(f);
 	down_read(&current->mm->mmap_sem);
 	return error;
 }

programming_language: C