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Message-ID: <aYFBbGmMTszT3ZRb@kernel.org>
Date: Tue, 3 Feb 2026 02:29:32 +0200
From: Jarkko Sakkinen <jarkko@...nel.org>
To: David Howells <dhowells@...hat.com>
Cc: Lukas Wunner <lukas@...ner.de>, Ignat Korchagin <ignat@...udflare.com>,
Herbert Xu <herbert@...dor.apana.org.au>,
Eric Biggers <ebiggers@...nel.org>,
Luis Chamberlain <mcgrof@...nel.org>,
Petr Pavlu <petr.pavlu@...e.com>,
Daniel Gomez <da.gomez@...nel.org>,
Sami Tolvanen <samitolvanen@...gle.com>,
"Jason A . Donenfeld" <Jason@...c4.com>,
Ard Biesheuvel <ardb@...nel.org>,
Stephan Mueller <smueller@...onox.de>, linux-crypto@...r.kernel.org,
keyrings@...r.kernel.org, linux-modules@...r.kernel.org,
linux-kernel@...r.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH v16 4/7] pkcs7: Allow the signing algo to do whatever
digestion it wants itself
On Mon, Feb 02, 2026 at 05:02:09PM +0000, David Howells wrote:
> Allow the data to be verified in a PKCS#7 or CMS message to be passed
> directly to an asymmetric cipher algorithm (e.g. ML-DSA) if it wants to do
> whatever passes for hashing/digestion itself. The normal digestion of the
> data is then skipped as that would be ignored unless another signed info in
> the message has some other algorithm that needs it.
>
> The 'data to be verified' may be the content of the PKCS#7 message or it
> will be the authenticatedAttributes (signedAttrs if CMS), modified, if
> those are present.
>
> This is done by:
>
> (1) Make ->m and ->m_size point to the data to be verified rather than
> making public_key_verify_signature() access the data directly. This
> is so that keyctl(KEYCTL_PKEY_VERIFY) will still work.
>
> (2) Add a flag, ->algo_takes_data, to indicate that the verification
> algorithm wants to access the data to be verified directly rather than
> having it digested first.
>
> (3) If the PKCS#7 message has authenticatedAttributes (or CMS
> signedAttrs), then the digest contained therein will be validated as
> now, and the modified attrs blob will either be digested or assigned
> to ->m as appropriate.
>
> (4) If present, always copy and modify the authenticatedAttributes (or
> signedAttrs) then digest that in one go rather than calling the shash
> update twice (once for the tag and once for the rest).
>
> (5) For ML-DSA, point ->m to the TBSCertificate instead of digesting it
> and using the digest.
>
> Note that whilst ML-DSA does allow for an "external mu", CMS doesn't yet
> have that standardised.
>
> Signed-off-by: David Howells <dhowells@...hat.com>
> cc: Lukas Wunner <lukas@...ner.de>
> cc: Ignat Korchagin <ignat@...udflare.com>
> cc: Stephan Mueller <smueller@...onox.de>
> cc: Eric Biggers <ebiggers@...nel.org>
> cc: Herbert Xu <herbert@...dor.apana.org.au>
> cc: keyrings@...r.kernel.org
> cc: linux-crypto@...r.kernel.org
> ---
> crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_parser.c | 4 +-
> crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_verify.c | 52 ++++++++++++++++--------
> crypto/asymmetric_keys/signature.c | 3 +-
> crypto/asymmetric_keys/x509_public_key.c | 10 +++++
> include/crypto/public_key.h | 2 +
> 5 files changed, 51 insertions(+), 20 deletions(-)
>
> diff --git a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_parser.c b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_parser.c
> index 423d13c47545..3cdbab3b9f50 100644
> --- a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_parser.c
> +++ b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_parser.c
> @@ -599,8 +599,8 @@ int pkcs7_sig_note_set_of_authattrs(void *context, size_t hdrlen,
> }
>
> /* We need to switch the 'CONT 0' to a 'SET OF' when we digest */
> - sinfo->authattrs = value - (hdrlen - 1);
> - sinfo->authattrs_len = vlen + (hdrlen - 1);
> + sinfo->authattrs = value - hdrlen;
> + sinfo->authattrs_len = vlen + hdrlen;
> return 0;
> }
>
> diff --git a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_verify.c b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_verify.c
> index aa085ec6fb1c..06abb9838f95 100644
> --- a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_verify.c
> +++ b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/pkcs7_verify.c
> @@ -30,6 +30,16 @@ static int pkcs7_digest(struct pkcs7_message *pkcs7,
>
> kenter(",%u,%s", sinfo->index, sinfo->sig->hash_algo);
>
> + if (!sinfo->authattrs && sig->algo_takes_data) {
> + /* There's no intermediate digest and the signature algo
> + * doesn't want the data prehashing.
> + */
> + sig->m = (void *)pkcs7->data;
> + sig->m_size = pkcs7->data_len;
> + sig->m_free = false;
> + return 0;
> + }
> +
> /* The digest was calculated already. */
> if (sig->m)
> return 0;
> @@ -48,9 +58,10 @@ static int pkcs7_digest(struct pkcs7_message *pkcs7,
> sig->m_size = crypto_shash_digestsize(tfm);
>
> ret = -ENOMEM;
> - sig->m = kmalloc(sig->m_size, GFP_KERNEL);
> + sig->m = kmalloc(umax(sinfo->authattrs_len, sig->m_size), GFP_KERNEL);
> if (!sig->m)
> goto error_no_desc;
> + sig->m_free = true;
>
> desc = kzalloc(desc_size, GFP_KERNEL);
> if (!desc)
> @@ -69,8 +80,6 @@ static int pkcs7_digest(struct pkcs7_message *pkcs7,
> * digest we just calculated.
> */
> if (sinfo->authattrs) {
> - u8 tag;
> -
> if (!sinfo->msgdigest) {
> pr_warn("Sig %u: No messageDigest\n", sinfo->index);
> ret = -EKEYREJECTED;
> @@ -96,21 +105,25 @@ static int pkcs7_digest(struct pkcs7_message *pkcs7,
> * as the contents of the digest instead. Note that we need to
> * convert the attributes from a CONT.0 into a SET before we
> * hash it.
> + *
> + * However, for certain algorithms, such as ML-DSA, the digest
> + * is integrated into the signing algorithm. In such a case,
> + * we copy the authattrs, modifying the tag type, and set that
> + * as the digest.
> */
> - memset(sig->m, 0, sig->m_size);
> -
> -
> - ret = crypto_shash_init(desc);
> - if (ret < 0)
> - goto error;
> - tag = ASN1_CONS_BIT | ASN1_SET;
> - ret = crypto_shash_update(desc, &tag, 1);
> - if (ret < 0)
> - goto error;
> - ret = crypto_shash_finup(desc, sinfo->authattrs,
> - sinfo->authattrs_len, sig->m);
> - if (ret < 0)
> - goto error;
> + memcpy(sig->m, sinfo->authattrs, sinfo->authattrs_len);
> + sig->m[0] = ASN1_CONS_BIT | ASN1_SET;
> +
> + if (sig->algo_takes_data) {
> + sig->m_size = sinfo->authattrs_len;
> + ret = 0;
> + } else {
> + ret = crypto_shash_digest(desc, sig->m,
> + sinfo->authattrs_len,
> + sig->m);
> + if (ret < 0)
> + goto error;
> + }
> pr_devel("AADigest = [%*ph]\n", 8, sig->m);
> }
>
> @@ -137,6 +150,11 @@ int pkcs7_get_digest(struct pkcs7_message *pkcs7, const u8 **buf, u32 *len,
> ret = pkcs7_digest(pkcs7, sinfo);
> if (ret)
> return ret;
> + if (!sinfo->sig->m_free) {
> + pr_notice_once("%s: No digest available\n", __func__);
> + return -EINVAL; /* TODO: MLDSA doesn't necessarily calculate an
> + * intermediate digest. */
Is this logic going to change in the foreseeable future?
> + }
>
> *buf = sinfo->sig->m;
> *len = sinfo->sig->m_size;
> diff --git a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/signature.c b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/signature.c
> index f4ec126121b3..a5ac7a53b670 100644
> --- a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/signature.c
> +++ b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/signature.c
> @@ -28,7 +28,8 @@ void public_key_signature_free(struct public_key_signature *sig)
> for (i = 0; i < ARRAY_SIZE(sig->auth_ids); i++)
> kfree(sig->auth_ids[i]);
> kfree(sig->s);
> - kfree(sig->m);
> + if (sig->m_free)
> + kfree(sig->m);
> kfree(sig);
> }
> }
> diff --git a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/x509_public_key.c b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/x509_public_key.c
> index 3854f7ae4ed0..27b4fea37845 100644
> --- a/crypto/asymmetric_keys/x509_public_key.c
> +++ b/crypto/asymmetric_keys/x509_public_key.c
> @@ -50,6 +50,14 @@ int x509_get_sig_params(struct x509_certificate *cert)
>
> sig->s_size = cert->raw_sig_size;
>
> + if (sig->algo_takes_data) {
> + /* The signature algorithm does whatever passes for hashing. */
> + sig->m = (u8 *)cert->tbs;
> + sig->m_size = cert->tbs_size;
> + sig->m_free = false;
> + goto out;
> + }
> +
> /* Allocate the hashing algorithm we're going to need and find out how
> * big the hash operational data will be.
> */
> @@ -69,6 +77,7 @@ int x509_get_sig_params(struct x509_certificate *cert)
> sig->m = kmalloc(sig->m_size, GFP_KERNEL);
> if (!sig->m)
> goto error;
> + sig->m_free = true;
>
> desc = kzalloc(desc_size, GFP_KERNEL);
> if (!desc)
> @@ -84,6 +93,7 @@ int x509_get_sig_params(struct x509_certificate *cert)
> kfree(desc);
> error:
> crypto_free_shash(tfm);
> +out:
> pr_devel("<==%s() = %d\n", __func__, ret);
> return ret;
> }
> diff --git a/include/crypto/public_key.h b/include/crypto/public_key.h
> index bd38ba4d217d..4c5199b20338 100644
> --- a/include/crypto/public_key.h
> +++ b/include/crypto/public_key.h
> @@ -46,6 +46,8 @@ struct public_key_signature {
> u8 *m; /* Message data to pass to verifier */
> u32 s_size; /* Number of bytes in signature */
> u32 m_size; /* Number of bytes in ->m */
> + bool m_free; /* T if ->m needs freeing */
> + bool algo_takes_data; /* T if public key algo operates on data, not a hash */
> const char *pkey_algo;
> const char *hash_algo;
> const char *encoding;
>
BR, Jarkko
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