linux-kernel - Re: Rust kernel policy

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]

Message-ID: <202502191117.8E1BCD4615@keescook>
Date: Wed, 19 Feb 2025 11:17:59 -0800
From: Kees Cook <kees@...nel.org>
To: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@...dmis.org>
Cc: Miguel Ojeda <miguel.ojeda.sandonis@...il.com>,
	Christoph Hellwig <hch@...radead.org>,
	rust-for-linux <rust-for-linux@...r.kernel.org>,
	Linus Torvalds <torvalds@...ux-foundation.org>,
	Greg KH <gregkh@...uxfoundation.org>,
	David Airlie <airlied@...il.com>, linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
	ksummit@...ts.linux.dev
Subject: Re: Rust kernel policy

On Wed, Feb 19, 2025 at 02:08:21PM -0500, Steven Rostedt wrote:
> On Wed, 19 Feb 2025 10:52:37 -0800
> Kees Cook <kees@...nel.org> wrote:
> 
> > In other words, I don't see any reason to focus on replacing existing
> > code -- doing so would actually carry a lot of risk. But writing *new*
> > stuff in Rust is very effective. Old code is more stable and has fewer
> > bugs already, and yet, we're still going to continue the work of hardening
> > C, because we still need to shake those bugs out. But *new* code can be
> > written in Rust, and not have any of these classes of bugs at all from
> > day one.
> 
> I would say *new drivers* than say *new code*. A lot of new code is written
> in existing infrastructure that doesn't mean it needs to be converted over
> to rust.

Sorry, yes, I was more accurate in the first paragraph. :)

> But that does show why enhancements to C like the guard() code is still
> very important.

Absolutely!

-- 
Kees Cook