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authorLinus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>2018-02-04 22:45:55 +0300
committerLinus Torvalds <torvalds@linux-foundation.org>2018-02-04 22:45:55 +0300
commit35277995e17919ab838beae765f440674e8576eb (patch)
treee35b60bb3c0c179f147e9acaad5444f1e5d9117e /Documentation
parent0a646e9c992e4846665dc995c86f30c599cda64c (diff)
parentb2ac58f90540e39324e7a29a7ad471407ae0bf48 (diff)
downloadlinux-35277995e17919ab838beae765f440674e8576eb.tar.xz
Merge branch 'x86-pti-for-linus' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/tip/tip
Pull spectre/meltdown updates from Thomas Gleixner: "The next round of updates related to melted spectrum: - The initial set of spectre V1 mitigations: - Array index speculation blocker and its usage for syscall, fdtable and the n180211 driver. - Speculation barrier and its usage in user access functions - Make indirect calls in KVM speculation safe - Blacklisting of known to be broken microcodes so IPBP/IBSR are not touched. - The initial IBPB support and its usage in context switch - The exposure of the new speculation MSRs to KVM guests. - A fix for a regression in x86/32 related to the cpu entry area - Proper whitelisting for known to be safe CPUs from the mitigations. - objtool fixes to deal proper with retpolines and alternatives - Exclude __init functions from retpolines which speeds up the boot process. - Removal of the syscall64 fast path and related cleanups and simplifications - Removal of the unpatched paravirt mode which is yet another source of indirect unproteced calls. - A new and undisputed version of the module mismatch warning - A couple of cleanup and correctness fixes all over the place Yet another step towards full mitigation. There are a few things still missing like the RBS underflow mitigation for Skylake and other small details, but that's being worked on. That said, I'm taking a belated christmas vacation for a week and hope that everything is magically solved when I'm back on Feb 12th" * 'x86-pti-for-linus' of git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/tip/tip: (37 commits) KVM/SVM: Allow direct access to MSR_IA32_SPEC_CTRL KVM/VMX: Allow direct access to MSR_IA32_SPEC_CTRL KVM/VMX: Emulate MSR_IA32_ARCH_CAPABILITIES KVM/x86: Add IBPB support KVM/x86: Update the reverse_cpuid list to include CPUID_7_EDX x86/speculation: Fix typo IBRS_ATT, which should be IBRS_ALL x86/pti: Mark constant arrays as __initconst x86/spectre: Simplify spectre_v2 command line parsing x86/retpoline: Avoid retpolines for built-in __init functions x86/kvm: Update spectre-v1 mitigation KVM: VMX: make MSR bitmaps per-VCPU x86/paravirt: Remove 'noreplace-paravirt' cmdline option x86/speculation: Use Indirect Branch Prediction Barrier in context switch x86/cpuid: Fix up "virtual" IBRS/IBPB/STIBP feature bits on Intel x86/spectre: Fix spelling mistake: "vunerable"-> "vulnerable" x86/spectre: Report get_user mitigation for spectre_v1 nl80211: Sanitize array index in parse_txq_params vfs, fdtable: Prevent bounds-check bypass via speculative execution x86/syscall: Sanitize syscall table de-references under speculation x86/get_user: Use pointer masking to limit speculation ...
Diffstat (limited to 'Documentation')
-rw-r--r--Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.txt2
-rw-r--r--Documentation/speculation.txt90
2 files changed, 90 insertions, 2 deletions
diff --git a/Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.txt b/Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.txt
index 90cefbddf1ed..512ccafa45b1 100644
--- a/Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.txt
+++ b/Documentation/admin-guide/kernel-parameters.txt
@@ -2758,8 +2758,6 @@
norandmaps Don't use address space randomization. Equivalent to
echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/randomize_va_space
- noreplace-paravirt [X86,IA-64,PV_OPS] Don't patch paravirt_ops
-
noreplace-smp [X86-32,SMP] Don't replace SMP instructions
with UP alternatives
diff --git a/Documentation/speculation.txt b/Documentation/speculation.txt
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..e9e6cbae2841
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Documentation/speculation.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,90 @@
+This document explains potential effects of speculation, and how undesirable
+effects can be mitigated portably using common APIs.
+
+===========
+Speculation
+===========
+
+To improve performance and minimize average latencies, many contemporary CPUs
+employ speculative execution techniques such as branch prediction, performing
+work which may be discarded at a later stage.
+
+Typically speculative execution cannot be observed from architectural state,
+such as the contents of registers. However, in some cases it is possible to
+observe its impact on microarchitectural state, such as the presence or
+absence of data in caches. Such state may form side-channels which can be
+observed to extract secret information.
+
+For example, in the presence of branch prediction, it is possible for bounds
+checks to be ignored by code which is speculatively executed. Consider the
+following code:
+
+ int load_array(int *array, unsigned int index)
+ {
+ if (index >= MAX_ARRAY_ELEMS)
+ return 0;
+ else
+ return array[index];
+ }
+
+Which, on arm64, may be compiled to an assembly sequence such as:
+
+ CMP <index>, #MAX_ARRAY_ELEMS
+ B.LT less
+ MOV <returnval>, #0
+ RET
+ less:
+ LDR <returnval>, [<array>, <index>]
+ RET
+
+It is possible that a CPU mis-predicts the conditional branch, and
+speculatively loads array[index], even if index >= MAX_ARRAY_ELEMS. This
+value will subsequently be discarded, but the speculated load may affect
+microarchitectural state which can be subsequently measured.
+
+More complex sequences involving multiple dependent memory accesses may
+result in sensitive information being leaked. Consider the following
+code, building on the prior example:
+
+ int load_dependent_arrays(int *arr1, int *arr2, int index)
+ {
+ int val1, val2,
+
+ val1 = load_array(arr1, index);
+ val2 = load_array(arr2, val1);
+
+ return val2;
+ }
+
+Under speculation, the first call to load_array() may return the value
+of an out-of-bounds address, while the second call will influence
+microarchitectural state dependent on this value. This may provide an
+arbitrary read primitive.
+
+====================================
+Mitigating speculation side-channels
+====================================
+
+The kernel provides a generic API to ensure that bounds checks are
+respected even under speculation. Architectures which are affected by
+speculation-based side-channels are expected to implement these
+primitives.
+
+The array_index_nospec() helper in <linux/nospec.h> can be used to
+prevent information from being leaked via side-channels.
+
+A call to array_index_nospec(index, size) returns a sanitized index
+value that is bounded to [0, size) even under cpu speculation
+conditions.
+
+This can be used to protect the earlier load_array() example:
+
+ int load_array(int *array, unsigned int index)
+ {
+ if (index >= MAX_ARRAY_ELEMS)
+ return 0;
+ else {
+ index = array_index_nospec(index, MAX_ARRAY_ELEMS);
+ return array[index];
+ }
+ }