memfd: do not -EACCES old memfd_create() users with vm.memfd_noexec=2
authorAleksa Sarai <cyphar@cyphar.com>
Mon, 14 Aug 2023 08:40:58 +0000 (18:40 +1000)
committerAndrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
Mon, 21 Aug 2023 20:37:59 +0000 (13:37 -0700)
commit202e14222fadb246dfdf182e67de1518e86a1e20
treee09b7fa9d7639d148c8c7caa2506be09ddbae94f
parent99f34659e78b9b781a3248e0b080b4dfca4957e2
memfd: do not -EACCES old memfd_create() users with vm.memfd_noexec=2

Given the difficulty of auditing all of userspace to figure out whether
every memfd_create() user has switched to passing MFD_EXEC and
MFD_NOEXEC_SEAL flags, it seems far less distruptive to make it possible
for older programs that don't make use of executable memfds to run under
vm.memfd_noexec=2.  Otherwise, a small dependency change can result in
spurious errors.  For programs that don't use executable memfds, passing
MFD_NOEXEC_SEAL is functionally a no-op and thus having the same

In addition, every failure under vm.memfd_noexec=2 needs to print to the
kernel log so that userspace can figure out where the error came from.
The concerns about pr_warn_ratelimited() spam that caused the switch to
pr_warn_once()[1,2] do not apply to the vm.memfd_noexec=2 case.

This is a user-visible API change, but as it allows programs to do
something that would be blocked before, and the sysctl itself was broken
and recently released, it seems unlikely this will cause any issues.

[1]: https://lore.kernel.org/Y5yS8wCnuYGLHMj4@x1n/
[2]: https://lore.kernel.org/202212161233.85C9783FB@keescook/

Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20230814-memfd-vm-noexec-uapi-fixes-v2-2-7ff9e3e10ba6@cyphar.com
Fixes: 105ff5339f49 ("mm/memfd: add MFD_NOEXEC_SEAL and MFD_EXEC")
Signed-off-by: Aleksa Sarai <cyphar@cyphar.com>
Cc: Dominique Martinet <asmadeus@codewreck.org>
Cc: Christian Brauner <brauner@kernel.org>
Cc: Daniel Verkamp <dverkamp@chromium.org>
Cc: Jeff Xu <jeffxu@google.com>
Cc: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>
Cc: Shuah Khan <shuah@kernel.org>
Cc: <stable@vger.kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>
include/linux/pid_namespace.h
mm/memfd.c
tools/testing/selftests/memfd/memfd_test.c