Re: [PATCH 1/1] fanotify: check permissions when creating file descriptor

From: Michael Kerrisk (man-pages)
Date: Tue Apr 22 2014 - 09:51:19 EST


On Tue, Apr 22, 2014 at 3:40 PM, Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Sat 19-04-14 22:53:53, Heinrich Schuchardt wrote:
>> When monitoring a directory or a mount with the fanotify API
>> the call to fanotify_init checks,
>> * the process has cap_sys_admin capability
>>
>> The call to fanotify_mark checks,
>> * the process has read authorization for directory or mount
>>
>> A directory or mount may contain files for which the process
>> has no read or write authorization.
>> Yet when reading from the fanotify file descriptor, structures
>> fanotify_event_metadata are returned, which contain a file
>> descriptor for these files, and will allow to read or write.
>>
>> The patch adds an authorization check for read and write
>> permission. In case of missing permission, reading from the
>> fanotify file descriptor returns EACCES.
> OK, am I right you are concerned about a situation where fanotify group
> descriptor is passed to an unpriviledged process which handles all the
> incoming events? I'm asking because the permission checking can be
> relatively expensive (think of acls) so we better do it for a reason.
> I'd prefer to hear from Eric what the original intention regarding
> permissions was...

If I understand correctly, passing to an unprivileged process is the
point. The point is I think that supposedly one only needs to
CAP_SYS_ADMIN to use fanotify. However, once you have that capability,
then you implicitly get the effect of CAP_DAC_READ_SEARCH and
CAP_DAC_OVERRIDE as well.

Cheers,

Michael


>> fs/notify/fanotify/fanotify_user.c | 20 +++++++++++++++-----
>> 1 file changed, 15 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)
>>
>> diff --git a/fs/notify/fanotify/fanotify_user.c b/fs/notify/fanotify/fanotify_user.c
>> index 4e565c8..5d22a20 100644
>> --- a/fs/notify/fanotify/fanotify_user.c
>> +++ b/fs/notify/fanotify/fanotify_user.c
>> @@ -62,6 +62,8 @@ static int create_fd(struct fsnotify_group *group,
>> {
>> int client_fd;
>> struct file *new_file;
>> + int mask;
>> + int ret;
>>
>> pr_debug("%s: group=%p event=%p\n", __func__, group, event);
>>
>> @@ -75,11 +77,19 @@ static int create_fd(struct fsnotify_group *group,
>> */
>> /* it's possible this event was an overflow event. in that case dentry and mnt
>> * are NULL; That's fine, just don't call dentry open */
>> - if (event->path.dentry && event->path.mnt)
>> - new_file = dentry_open(&event->path,
>> - group->fanotify_data.f_flags | FMODE_NONOTIFY,
>> - current_cred());
>> - else
>> + if (event->path.dentry && event->path.mnt) {
>> + /* check permissions before granting access to file */
>> + mask = MAY_READ;
>> + if (group->fanotify_data.f_flags & (O_RDWR | O_WRONLY))
>> + mask |= MAY_WRITE;
>> + ret = inode_permission(event->path.dentry->d_inode, mask);
>> + if (ret)
>> + new_file = ERR_PTR(ret);
>> + else
>> + new_file = dentry_open(&event->path,
>> + group->fanotify_data.f_flags | FMODE_NONOTIFY,
>> + current_cred());
>> + } else
>> new_file = ERR_PTR(-EOVERFLOW);
>> if (IS_ERR(new_file)) {
>> /*
>> --
>> 1.9.1
>>
> --
> Jan Kara <jack@xxxxxxx>
> SUSE Labs, CR



--
Michael Kerrisk
Linux man-pages maintainer; http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/
Linux/UNIX System Programming Training: http://man7.org/training/
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