linux-kernel - Re: security: delete BIOS password in keyboard buffer during kernel bootup

lists.openwall.net		lists / announce owl-users owl-dev john-users john-dev passwdqc-users yescrypt popa3d-users / oss-security kernel-hardening musl sabotage tlsify passwords / crypt-dev xvendor / Bugtraq Full-Disclosure linux-kernel linux-netdev linux-ext4 linux-hardening linux-cve-announce PHC
Open Source and information security mailing list archives

Hash Suite: Windows password security audit tool. GUI, reports in PDF.

[<prev] [next>] [<thread-prev] [thread-next>] [day] [month] [year] [list]

Date:	Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:18:09 +0100
From:	Pavel Machek <pavel@...e.cz>
To:	Alan Cox <alan@...rguk.ukuu.org.uk>
Cc:	mathias.schnarrenberger@....de,
	Olaf van der Spek <olafvdspek@...il.com>,
	linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: security: delete BIOS password in keyboard buffer during
	kernel bootup

On Sun 2008-11-09 11:08:14, Alan Cox wrote:
> On Sun, 9 Nov 2008 09:41:20 +0100
> Mathias Schnarrenberger <mathias.schnarrenberger@....de> wrote:
> 
> > > What if my BIOS stores some critical info at that memory address?
> > > I don't think the kernel is the right place to work around this issue.
> > 
> > AFAIK every IBM PC compatible BIOS stores the keyboard buffer in this area.
> 
> Not every system we boot the x86 kernel on is a PC compatible.

OTOH we don't call BIOS from linux, so we assume that low 64K is
usable memory (unless marked otherwise in memmap, I guess).

Anyway, proper place to do clearing is bootloader; it interacts with
bios already, anyway...

-- 
(english) http://www.livejournal.com/~pavelmachek
(cesky, pictures) http://atrey.karlin.mff.cuni.cz/~pavel/picture/horses/blog.html
--
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@...r.kernel.org
More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/