linux-kernel - Re: [PATCH] kernel/sys.c: fix possible spectre-v1 in do

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Date:   Wed, 29 May 2019 15:18:31 +0300
From:   Cyrill Gorcunov <gorcunov@...il.com>
To:     Dianzhang Chen <dianzhangchen0@...il.com>
Cc:     LKML <linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] kernel/sys.c: fix possible spectre-v1 in do_prlimit()

On Wed, May 29, 2019 at 10:39:52AM +0800, Dianzhang Chen wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Although when detect it is misprediction and drop the execution, but
> it can not drop all the effects of speculative execution, like the
> cache state. During the speculative execution, the:
> 
> 
> rlim = tsk->signal->rlim + resource;    // use resource as index
> 
> ...
> 
>             *old_rlim = *rlim;
> 
> 
> may read some secret data into cache.
> 
> and then the attacker can use side-channel attack to find out what the
> secret data is.

This code works after check_prlimit_permission call, which means you already
should have a permission granted. And you implies that misprediction gonna
be that deep which involves a number of calls/read/writes/jumps/locks-rb-wb-flushes
and a bunch or other instructions, moreover all conditions are "mispredicted".
This is very bold and actually unproved claim!

Note that I pointed the patch is fine in cleanup context but seriously I
don't see how this all can be exploitable in sense of spectre.