linux-kernel - [PATCH] arm64: head: set TEXT_OFFSET to the historical value

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-next>] [day] [month] [year] [list]

Message-Id: <20251006-arm64-text-offset-v1-1-bf0e8a27383b@oss.qualcomm.com>
Date: Mon, 06 Oct 2025 01:21:04 +0300
From: Dmitry Baryshkov <dmitry.baryshkov@....qualcomm.com>
To: Catalin Marinas <catalin.marinas@....com>, Will Deacon <will@...nel.org>,
        Bjorn Andersson <andersson@...nel.org>,
        Konrad Dybcio <konradybcio@...nel.org>,
        David Heidelberg <david@...t.cz>
Cc: linux-arm-kernel@...ts.infradead.org, linux-arm-msm@...r.kernel.org,
        linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org,
        Dmitry Baryshkov <dmitry.baryshkov@...aro.org>
Subject: [PATCH] arm64: head: set TEXT_OFFSET to the historical value

From: Dmitry Baryshkov <dmitry.baryshkov@...aro.org>

Historically arm64 kernel contained (almost fixed) value of 0x8000 at
the TEXT_OFFSET. The commit cfa7ede20f13 ("arm64: set TEXT_OFFSET to 0x0
in preparation for removing it entirely") and then commit 120dc60d0bdb
("arm64: get rid of TEXT_OFFSET") replaced this field with 0.

This caused no problems so far, because nobody seemed to be playing with
the extremely picky Qualcomm bootloader as used on some of Google Pixel
phones. Current attempting to boot the Linux kernel on those devices
will fail to load on those phones with the following message:

KernelDecompress failed: Invalid Parameter Kernel TextOffset does not match
Error calling BootPrepareAsync Invalid Parameter

Since the kernel ignores the field, set it to the expected value of
0x8000, unbreaking boot of upstream kernels on Qualcomm devices.

Note: I purposedly didn't add Fixes tags, since those commits didn't
break any of devices that were supported at that time.

Signed-off-by: Dmitry Baryshkov <dmitry.baryshkov@...aro.org>
Signed-off-by: Dmitry Baryshkov <dmitry.baryshkov@....qualcomm.com>
---
 arch/arm64/kernel/head.S | 2 +-
 1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/arch/arm64/kernel/head.S b/arch/arm64/kernel/head.S
index ca04b338cb0d173f6d9f5bcee52f6d3d06552599..05e874977de376835625f52bfdda78305dca28b5 100644
--- a/arch/arm64/kernel/head.S
+++ b/arch/arm64/kernel/head.S
@@ -60,7 +60,7 @@
 	 */
 	efi_signature_nop			// special NOP to identity as PE/COFF executable
 	b	primary_entry			// branch to kernel start, magic
-	.quad	0				// Image load offset from start of RAM, little-endian
+	.quad	0x80000				// Image load offset from start of RAM, little-endian
 	le64sym	_kernel_size_le			// Effective size of kernel image, little-endian
 	le64sym	_kernel_flags_le		// Informative flags, little-endian
 	.quad	0				// reserved

---
base-commit: bd773c01d149aec064ea0fc890a54be277acfa3b
change-id: 20251006-arm64-text-offset-a45fee505c4d

Best regards,
-- 
With best wishes
Dmitry