linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH 01/13] devpts: Teach /dev/ptmx to find the associated devpts via path lookup

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Message-ID: <87d1pzn60f.fsf@x220.int.ebiederm.org>
Date:	Fri, 08 Apr 2016 16:29:52 -0500
From:	ebiederm@...ssion.com (Eric W. Biederman)
To:	Andy Lutomirski <luto@...capital.net>
Cc:	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
	security@...ian.org, "security\@kernel.org" <security@...nel.org>,
	Al Viro <viro@...iv.linux.org.uk>,
	"security\@ubuntu.com \>\> security" <security@...ntu.com>,
	Peter Hurley <peter@...leysoftware.com>,
	Serge Hallyn <serge.hallyn@...ntu.com>,
	Willy Tarreau <w@....eu>,
	Aurelien Jarno <aurelien@...el32.net>,
	Jann Horn <jann@...jh.net>, Greg KH <greg@...ah.com>,
	Linux Kernel Mailing List <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>,
	Jiri Slaby <jslaby@...e.com>,
	Florian Weimer <fw@...eb.enyo.de>,
	"H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@...or.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH 01/13] devpts: Teach /dev/ptmx to find the associated devpts via path lookup

Andy Lutomirski <luto@...capital.net> writes:

> On Apr 8, 2016 12:05 PM, "Linus Torvalds" <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org> wrote:
>>
>> On Fri, Apr 8, 2016 at 11:51 AM, Eric W. Biederman
>> <ebiederm@...ssion.com> wrote:
>> >
>> > Given that concern under the rule we don't break userspace we have to
>> > check the permissions of /dev/pts/ptmx when we are creating a new pty,
>> > on a instance of devpts that was created with newinstance.
>>
>> The rule is that we don't break existing installations.
>>
>> If somebody has root and installs a "ptmx" node in an existing mount
>> space next to a pts subdirectory, that's not a security issue, nor is
>> it going to break any existing installation.
>
> What Eric's saying is that you don't have to be root for this.
>
> But Eric, I think there might be a better mitigation.  For a ptmx
> chardev, just fail the open if the chardev's vfsmount or the devpts's
> vfsmount doesn't belong to the same userns as the devpts's superblock.
> After all, setting this attack up requires the caps on one of the
> vfsmounts, and if you have those caps you could attack your own devpts
> instance quite easily.  Would that work?

I don't think so.  For one it depends on getting s_user_ns which should
happen but is not there yet.  For another the way you describe
it you would break the case of

	unshare(CLONE_NEWUSER);
	unshare(CLONE_NEWNS);
        open("/dev/ptmx");

Which is actually more likely to break userspace than anything else we
have considered.  I know people actually do that.


Also using any property from a mount namespace or a vfs mount is usually
an error, as it is an inconsistent model.

Plus I don't think what you are suggesting would make anything simpler
or easier to reason about.  It only costs me about 3 lines of code to
perform the permission checks.  The complaint is that they exist at all.

Eric