On Fri, Feb 17, 2012 at 3:24 PM, Andrew Morton <akpm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > On Sat, 7 Jan 2012 10:55:48 -0800 > Kees Cook <keescook@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > >> A long-standing class of security issues is the symlink-based >> time-of-check-time-of-use race, most commonly seen in world-writable >> directories like /tmp. The common method of exploitation of this flaw >> is to cross privilege boundaries when following a given symlink (i.e. a >> root process follows a symlink belonging to another user). For a likely >> incomplete list of hundreds of examples across the years, please see: >> http://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvekey.cgi?keyword=/tmp >> >> The solution is to permit symlinks to only be followed when outside >> a sticky world-writable directory, or when the uid of the symlink and >> follower match, or when the directory owner matches the symlink's owner. >> >> Some pointers to the history of earlier discussion that I could find: >> >> 1996 Aug, Zygo Blaxell >> http://marc.info/?l=bugtraq&m=87602167419830&w=2 >> 1996 Oct, Andrew Tridgell >> http://lkml.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/9610.2/0086.html >> 1997 Dec, Albert D Cahalan >> http://lkml.org/lkml/1997/12/16/4 >> 2005 Feb, Lorenzo Hern__ndez Garc__a-Hierro >> http://lkml.indiana.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0502.0/1896.html >> 2010 May, Kees Cook >> https://lkml.org/lkml/2010/5/30/144 >> >> Past objections and rebuttals could be summarized as: >> >> - Violates POSIX. >> - POSIX didn't consider this situation and it's not useful to follow >> a broken specification at the cost of security. >> - Might break unknown applications that use this feature. >> - Applications that break because of the change are easy to spot and >> fix. Applications that are vulnerable to symlink ToCToU by not having >> the change aren't. Additionally, no applications have yet been found >> that rely on this behavior. >> - Applications should just use mkstemp() or O_CREATE|O_EXCL. >> - True, but applications are not perfect, and new software is written >> all the time that makes these mistakes; blocking this flaw at the >> kernel is a single solution to the entire class of vulnerability. >> - This should live in the core VFS. >> - This should live in an LSM. (https://lkml.org/lkml/2010/5/31/135) >> - This should live in an LSM. >> - This should live in the core VFS. (https://lkml.org/lkml/2010/8/2/188) >> >> This patch is based on the patch in Openwall and grsecurity, along with >> suggestions from Al Viro. I have added a sysctl to enable the protected >> behavior, documentation, and an audit notification. > > Looks reasonable to me. > > It's a viropatch. I shall merge it into 3.4-rc1 if nothing happens to > prevent that. Thanks! >> +config PROTECTED_STICKY_SYMLINKS >> + bool "Evaluate vulnerable symlink conditions" >> + default y >> + help >> + A long-standing class of security issues is the symlink-based >> + time-of-check-time-of-use race, most commonly seen in >> + world-writable directories like /tmp. The common method of >> + exploitation of this flaw is to cross privilege boundaries >> + when following a given symlink (i.e. a root process follows >> + a malicious symlink belonging to another user). >> + >> + Enabling this adds the logic to examine these dangerous symlink >> + conditions. Whether or not the dangerous symlink situations are >> + allowed is controlled by PROTECTED_STICKY_SYMLINKS_ENABLED. >> + >> +config PROTECTED_STICKY_SYMLINKS_ENABLED >> + depends on PROTECTED_STICKY_SYMLINKS >> + bool "Disallow symlink following in sticky world-writable dirs" >> + default y >> + help >> + Solve ToCToU symlink race vulnerablities by permitting symlinks >> + to be followed only when outside a sticky world-writable directory, >> + or when the uid of the symlink and follower match, or when the >> + directory and symlink owners match. >> + >> + When PROC_SYSCTL is enabled, this setting can also be controlled >> + via /proc/sys/kernel/protected_sticky_symlinks. > > I think I disagree with this. If the person compiling the kernel > includes the feature in his kernel via the time-honoured process of > "wtf is that thing? Yeah, whatev", it gets turned on by default. This > could easily result in weird failures which would take a *long* time > for an unsuspecting person to debug. > > Would it not be kinder to our users to start this out as > turned-off-at-runtime unless the kernel configurer has deliberately > gone in and enabled it? There was a fair bit of back-and-forth discussion about it. Originally, I had it disabled, but, IIRC, Ingo urged me to have it be the default. I can sent a patch to disable it if you want. >> --- a/kernel/sysctl.c >> +++ b/kernel/sysctl.c >> @@ -109,6 +109,9 @@ extern int sysctl_nr_trim_pages; >> #ifdef CONFIG_BLOCK >> extern int blk_iopoll_enabled; >> #endif >> +#ifdef CONFIG_PROTECTED_STICKY_SYMLINKS >> +extern int sysctl_protected_sticky_symlinks; >> +#endif >> > > Grumble. Yes, it's a site of much badness. Let's not worsen things. > > From: Andrew Morton <akpm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > Subject: fs-symlink-restrictions-on-sticky-directories-fix > > move sysctl_protected_sticky_symlinks declaration into .h > > Cc: Kees Cook <keescook@xxxxxxxxxxxx> > Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > > --- a/kernel/sysctl.c~fs-symlink-restrictions-on-sticky-directories-fix > +++ a/kernel/sysctl.c > @@ -109,9 +109,6 @@ extern int sysctl_nr_trim_pages; > #ifdef CONFIG_BLOCK > extern int blk_iopoll_enabled; > #endif > -#ifdef CONFIG_PROTECTED_STICKY_SYMLINKS > -extern int sysctl_protected_sticky_symlinks; > -#endif > > /* Constants used for minimum and maximum */ > #ifdef CONFIG_LOCKUP_DETECTOR > --- a/include/linux/fs.h~fs-symlink-restrictions-on-sticky-directories-fix > +++ a/include/linux/fs.h > @@ -422,6 +422,7 @@ extern unsigned long get_max_files(void) > extern int sysctl_nr_open; > extern struct inodes_stat_t inodes_stat; > extern int leases_enable, lease_break_time; > +extern int sysctl_protected_sticky_symlinks; > > struct buffer_head; > typedef int (get_block_t)(struct inode *inode, sector_t iblock, Ah, sure. That works for me. Thanks! -Kees -- Kees Cook ChromeOS Security -- To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-doc" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
