CVE-2023-52562 mm/slab_common: fix slab_caches list corruption after kmem_cache_destroy()

2024-03-0221:59:35

Linux

www.cve.org

linux kernel vulnerability

kmem_cache_destroy

slab_caches list corruption

config_debug_list

list_del corruption

kernel panic

config_slub

slub_debug

shutdown_cache()

8.6 High

AI Score

Confidence

High

0.0004 Low

EPSS

Percentile

15.5%

JSON

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

mm/slab_common: fix slab_caches list corruption after kmem_cache_destroy()

After the commit in Fixes:, if a module that created a slab cache does not
release all of its allocated objects before destroying the cache (at rmmod
time), we might end up releasing the kmem_cache object without removing it
from the slab_caches list thus corrupting the list as kmem_cache_destroy()
ignores the return value from shutdown_cache(), which in turn never removes
the kmem_cache object from slabs_list in case __kmem_cache_shutdown() fails
to release all of the cache’s slabs.

This is easily observable on a kernel built with CONFIG_DEBUG_LIST=y
as after that ill release the system will immediately trip on list_add,
or list_del, assertions similar to the one shown below as soon as another
kmem_cache gets created, or destroyed:

[ 1041.213632] list_del corruption. next->prev should be ffff89f596fb5768, but was 52f1e5016aeee75d. (next=ffff89f595a1b268)
[ 1041.219165] ------------[ cut here ]------------
[ 1041.221517] kernel BUG at lib/list_debug.c:62!
[ 1041.223452] invalid opcode: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP PTI
[ 1041.225408] CPU: 2 PID: 1852 Comm: rmmod Kdump: loaded Tainted: G B W OE 6.5.0 #15
[ 1041.228244] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS edk2-20230524-3.fc37 05/24/2023
[ 1041.231212] RIP: 0010:__list_del_entry_valid+0xae/0xb0

Another quick way to trigger this issue, in a kernel with CONFIG_SLUB=y,
is to set slub_debug to poison the released objects and then just run
cat /proc/slabinfo after removing the module that leaks slab objects,
in which case the kernel will panic:

[ 50.954843] general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xa56b6b6b6b6b6b8b: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP PTI
[ 50.961545] CPU: 2 PID: 1495 Comm: cat Kdump: loaded Tainted: G B W OE 6.5.0 #15
[ 50.966808] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS edk2-20230524-3.fc37 05/24/2023
[ 50.972663] RIP: 0010:get_slabinfo+0x42/0xf0

This patch fixes this issue by properly checking shutdown_cache()'s
return value before taking the kmem_cache_release() branch.

CNA Affected

[
  {
    "product": "Linux",
    "vendor": "Linux",
    "defaultStatus": "unaffected",
    "repo": "https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git",
    "programFiles": [
      "mm/slab_common.c"
    ],
    "versions": [
      {
        "version": "0495e337b703",
        "lessThan": "a5569bb18752",
        "status": "affected",
        "versionType": "git"
      },
      {
        "version": "0495e337b703",
        "lessThan": "51988be187b0",
        "status": "affected",
        "versionType": "git"
      },
      {
        "version": "0495e337b703",
        "lessThan": "46a9ea668190",
        "status": "affected",
        "versionType": "git"
      }
    ]
  },
  {
    "product": "Linux",
    "vendor": "Linux",
    "defaultStatus": "affected",
    "repo": "https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git",
    "programFiles": [
      "mm/slab_common.c"
    ],
    "versions": [
      {
        "version": "6.0",
        "status": "affected"
      },
      {
        "version": "0",
        "lessThan": "6.0",
        "status": "unaffected",
        "versionType": "custom"
      },
      {
        "version": "6.1.56",
        "lessThanOrEqual": "6.1.*",
        "status": "unaffected",
        "versionType": "custom"
      },
      {
        "version": "6.5.6",
        "lessThanOrEqual": "6.5.*",
        "status": "unaffected",
        "versionType": "custom"
      },
      {
        "version": "6.6",
        "lessThanOrEqual": "*",
        "status": "unaffected",
        "versionType": "original_commit_for_fix"
      }
    ]
  }
]