Re: [RFC 0/9] ARMv8.3 pointer authentication userspace support

From: Adam Wallis
Date: Fri Apr 07 2017 - 11:10:01 EST


On 4/3/2017 11:19 AM, Mark Rutland wrote:
> This series adds support for the ARMv8.3 pointer authentication extension.
>
> I've included a quick intro to the extension below, with the usual series
> description below that. The final patch of the series adds additional
> documentation regarding the extension.
>
> I've based the series on the arm64 for-next/core branch [1]. I'm aware that
> this series may conflict with other patches currently in flight (e.g.
> allocation of ELF notes), and I intend to rebase this series as things settle.
>
> I've pushed the series to the arm64/pointer-auth branch [2] of my linux tree.
> I've also pushed out a necessary bootwrapper patch to the pointer-auth branch
> [3] of my bootwrapper repo.
>
>
> Extension Overview
> ==================
>
> The ARMv8.3 pointer authentication extension adds functionality to detect
> modification of pointer values, mitigating certain classes of attack such as
> stack smashing, and making return oriented programming attacks harder
>
> The extension introduces the concept of a pointer authentication code (PAC),
> which is stored in some upper bits of pointers. Each PAC is derived from the
> original pointer, another 64-bit value (e.g. the stack pointer), and a secret
> 128-bit key.
>
> New instructions are added which can be used to:
>
> * Insert a PAC into a pointer
> * Strip a PAC from a pointer
> * Authenticate strip a PAC from a pointer
>
> If authentication succeeds, the code is removed, yielding the original pointer.
> If authentication fails, bits are set in the pointer such that it is guaranteed
> to cause a fault if used.
>
> These instructions can make use of four keys:
>
> * APIAKey (A.K.A. Instruction A key)
> * APIBKey (A.K.A. Instruction B key)
> * APDAKey (A.K.A. Data A key)
> * APDBKey (A.K.A. Data B Key)
>
> A subset of these instruction encodings have been allocated from the HINT
> space, and will operate as NOPs on any ARMv8 parts which do not feature the
> extension (or if purposefully disabled by the kernel). Software using only this
> subset of the instructions should function correctly on all ARMv8-A parts.
>
> Additionally, instructions are added to authenticate small blocks of memory in
> similar fashion, using APGAKey (A.K.A. Generic key).
>
>
> This Series
> ===========
>
> This series enables the use of instructions using APIAKey, which is initialised
> and maintained per-process (shared by all threads). This series does not add
> support for APIBKey, APDAKey, APDBKey, nor APGAKey. The series only supports
> the use of an architected algorithm.
>
> I've given this some basic testing with a homebrew test suite. More ideally,
> we'd add some tests to the kernel source tree.
>
> I've added some basic KVM support, but this doesn't cater for systems with
> mismatched support. Looking forward, we'll need ID register emulation in KVM so
> that we can hide features from guests to cater for cases like this.
>
> There are also a few questions to consider, e.g:
>
> * Should we expose a per-process data key now, to go with the insn key?
> * Should keys be per-thread rather than per-process?
> * Should we expose generic authentication (i.e. APGAKey)?
> * Should the kernel remove PACs when unwinding user stacks?
>
> Thanks,
> Mark.
>
> [1] git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/arm64/linux.git for-next/core
> [2] git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/mark/linux.git arm64/pointer-auth
> [3] git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/mark/boot-wrapper-aarch64.git pointer-auth
>
> Mark Rutland (9):
> asm-generic: mm_hooks: allow hooks to be overridden individually
> arm64: add pointer authentication register bits
> arm64/cpufeature: add ARMv8.3 id_aa64isar1 bits
> arm64/cpufeature: detect pointer authentication
> arm64: Don't trap host pointer auth use to EL2
> arm64: add basic pointer authentication support
> arm64: expose PAC bit positions via ptrace
> arm64/kvm: context-switch PAC registers
> arm64: docs: document pointer authentication
>
> Documentation/arm64/booting.txt | 8 +++
> Documentation/arm64/pointer-authentication.txt | 78 +++++++++++++++++++++
> arch/arm64/Kconfig | 23 ++++++
> arch/arm64/include/asm/cpucaps.h | 4 +-
> arch/arm64/include/asm/esr.h | 3 +-
> arch/arm64/include/asm/kvm_arm.h | 2 +
> arch/arm64/include/asm/kvm_emulate.h | 15 ++++
> arch/arm64/include/asm/kvm_host.h | 12 ++++
> arch/arm64/include/asm/mmu.h | 5 ++
> arch/arm64/include/asm/mmu_context.h | 25 ++++++-
> arch/arm64/include/asm/pointer_auth.h | 96 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> arch/arm64/include/asm/sysreg.h | 30 ++++++++
> arch/arm64/include/uapi/asm/hwcap.h | 1 +
> arch/arm64/include/uapi/asm/ptrace.h | 5 ++
> arch/arm64/kernel/cpufeature.c | 39 ++++++++++-
> arch/arm64/kernel/cpuinfo.c | 1 +
> arch/arm64/kernel/head.S | 19 ++++-
> arch/arm64/kernel/ptrace.c | 39 +++++++++++
> arch/arm64/kvm/hyp/sysreg-sr.c | 43 ++++++++++++
> include/asm-generic/mm_hooks.h | 12 ++++
> include/uapi/linux/elf.h | 1 +
> 21 files changed, 454 insertions(+), 7 deletions(-)
> create mode 100644 Documentation/arm64/pointer-authentication.txt
> create mode 100644 arch/arm64/include/asm/pointer_auth.h
>

Tested on Qualcomm platform with ARMV8 architecture (without 8.3 extensions) for
backwards compatibility (meaning I did not pass -march=armv8.3-a to GCC; only
-msign-return-address=all). The HINT PACIASP/AUTIASP caused no issues and no
other issues were encountered. Will test again once a platform is available with
8.3-a extensions.

Thanks

--
Adam Wallis
Qualcomm Datacenter Technologies as an affiliate of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.
Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. is a member of the Code Aurora Forum,
a Linux Foundation Collaborative Project.