The mems_allowed field can be modified by other tasks, so it isn't safe to access it with alloc_lock unlocked even in the current process context. Say there are two tasks: A from cpusetA is performing set_mempolicy(2), and B is changing cpusetA's cpuset.mems: A (set_mempolicy) B (echo xx > cpuset.mems) ------------------------------------------------------- pol = mpol_new(); update_tasks_nodemask(cpusetA) { foreach t in cpusetA { cpuset_change_task_nodemask(t) { mpol_set_nodemask(pol) { task_lock(t); // t could be A new = f(A->mems_allowed); update t->mems_allowed; pol.create(pol, new); task_unlock(t); } } } } task_lock(A); A->mempolicy = pol; task_unlock(A); In this case A's pol->nodes is computed by old mems_allowed, and could be inconsistent with A's new mems_allowed. While it is different when replacing vmas' policy: the pol->nodes is gone wild only when current_cpuset_is_being_rebound(): A (mbind) B (echo xx > cpuset.mems) ------------------------------------------------------- pol = mpol_new(); mmap_write_lock(A->mm); cpuset_being_rebound = cpusetA; update_tasks_nodemask(cpusetA) { foreach t in cpusetA { cpuset_change_task_nodemask(t) { mpol_set_nodemask(pol) { task_lock(t); // t could be A mask = f(A->mems_allowed); update t->mems_allowed; pol.create(pol, mask); task_unlock(t); } } foreach v in A->mm { if (cpuset_being_rebound == cpusetA) pol.rebind(pol, cpuset.mems); v->vma_policy = pol; } mmap_write_unlock(A->mm); mmap_write_lock(t->mm); mpol_rebind_mm(t->mm); mmap_write_unlock(t->mm); } } cpuset_being_rebound = NULL; In this case, the cpuset.mems, which has already done updating, is finally used for calculating pol->nodes, rather than A->mems_allowed. So it is OK to call mpol_set_nodemask() with alloc_lock unlocked when doing mbind(2). Fixes: 78b132e9bae9 ("mm/mempolicy: remove or narrow the lock on current") Signed-off-by: Abel Wu <wuyun.abel@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> --- mm/mempolicy.c | 4 +++- 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-) diff --git a/mm/mempolicy.c b/mm/mempolicy.c index d39b01fd52fe..61e4e6f5cfe8 100644 --- a/mm/mempolicy.c +++ b/mm/mempolicy.c @@ -855,12 +855,14 @@ static long do_set_mempolicy(unsigned short mode, unsigned short flags, goto out; } + task_lock(current); ret = mpol_set_nodemask(new, nodes, scratch); if (ret) { + task_unlock(current); mpol_put(new); goto out; } - task_lock(current); + old = current->mempolicy; current->mempolicy = new; if (new && new->mode == MPOL_INTERLEAVE) -- 2.31.1