d_path() truncating excessive long path name vulnerability

From: Wojciech Purczynski (cliph@isec.pl)
Date: Tue Mar 26 2002 - 08:40:20 EST


-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

Name: Linux kernel
Version: up to 2.2.20 and 2.4.18
Homepage: http://www.kernel.org/
Author: Wojciech Purczynski <cliph@isec.pl>
Date: March 26, 2002

Issue:
======

In case of excessively long path names d_path kernel internal function
returns truncated trailing components of a path name instead of an error
value. As this function is called by getcwd(2) system call and
do_proc_readlink() function, false information may be returned to
user-space processes.

Description:
============

Linux is a clone of the operating system Unix, written from scratch by
Linus Torvalds with assistance from a loosely-knit team of hackers across
the Net. It aims towards POSIX and Single UNIX Specification compliance.

Details:
========

d_path kernel function resolves a string of absolute path name of a dentry
passed as an argument to the function.

The path is a concatenation of subsequent path components starting from
trailing path component. The concatenated path name is stored into a
fixed-length buffer of PAGE_SIZE bytes.

If a dentry points to a path that exceeds PAGE_SIZE - 1 characters length,
leading path components are not written to the buffer and function returns
truncated path without an error value.

Because getcwd(2) system call uses d_path() function, it may return
invalid path to the user-space process. However, if a returned path is
longer than user-space buffer a correct error value is returned.

readlink(2) system call called on proc filesystem uses do_proc_readlink()
function which is also vulnerable to d_path() bug.

Impact:
=======

Privileged process may be tricked to think it is inside of arbitrary
directory. Other scenarios are possible if readlink() is used on files on
proc filesystem (like "/proc/self/exe").

PS: Please CC to security@isec.pl as I may not be subscribed to the list.

- --
Wojciech Purczynski
iSEC Security Research
http://isec.pl/

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org

iD8DBQE8oHpKC+8U3Z5wpu4RAn6qAJ4seIO2xfXvrHmTMFQoMkGus23fJwCgjka7
ew84vFEFTO8lI7PQgEdyG0c=
=sEfh
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----



-
To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/



This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Mar 31 2002 - 22:00:11 EST