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Message-ID: <20100601190102.GT31073@ZenIV.linux.org.uk>
Date: Tue, 1 Jun 2010 20:01:02 +0100
From: Al Viro <viro@...IV.linux.org.uk>
To: Kees Cook <kees.cook@...onical.com>
Cc: Eric Paris <eparis@...hat.com>,
Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org>,
James Morris <jmorris@...ei.org>, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
linux-security-module@...r.kernel.org,
linux-fsdevel@...r.kernel.org, linux-doc@...r.kernel.org,
Randy Dunlap <rdunlap@...otime.net>,
Andrew Morton <akpm@...ux-foundation.org>,
Jiri Kosina <jkosina@...e.cz>,
Dave Young <hidave.darkstar@...il.com>,
Martin Schwidefsky <schwidefsky@...ibm.com>,
David Howells <dhowells@...hat.com>,
Ingo Molnar <mingo@...e.hu>,
Peter Zijlstra <a.p.zijlstra@...llo.nl>,
"Eric W. Biederman" <ebiederm@...ssion.com>,
Tim Gardner <tim.gardner@...onical.com>,
"Serge E. Hallyn" <serue@...ibm.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH v3] fs: allow protected cross-uid sticky symlinks
On Tue, Jun 01, 2010 at 11:52:48AM -0700, Kees Cook 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:
I don't buy it. If we are concerned about the symlinks in the middle of
pathname, your checks are useless (mkdir /tmp/a, ln -s whatever /tmp/a/b,
have victim open /tmp/a/b/something). If we are not, then your checks are
in the wrong place.
"The more we prohibit, the safer we are" is best left to the likes of TSA;
if we are really interested in security and not in security theatre or
BDSM fetishism, let's make sure that heuristics we use make sense.
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