Re: Race in ptrace.

From: Oleg Nesterov
Date: Thu Feb 11 2010 - 07:57:13 EST


On 02/10, Salman Qazi wrote:
>
> I have
> made a simpler version of tavis's test case:

Thanks, now I see what you mean.

But this all is correct, you can't expect PTRACE_SYSCALL can succeed
is the tracee is running, it must be stopped or traced.

The tracee is running because it was TASK_STOPPED and antagonist()
sends SIGCONT.

The tracee was TASK_STOPPED because the tracer passes sig = SIGSTOP
via ptrace(PTRACE_SYSCALL, WSTOPSIG(status).

Where do you see the bug?

OK, let me simplify the test-case even more:

int main(void)
{
int stat, ret;
int pid = fork();

if (!pid) {
ptrace(PTRACE_TRACEME, 0, NULL, NULL);
for (;;)
;
}

sleep(1); // wait for PTRACE_TRACEME
kill(pid, SIGSTOP);

// the child reports SIGSTOP, it is TASK_TRACED
assert(pid == wait(&stat) && WIFSTOPPED(stat));

// the tracee should stop, we pass sig = SIGSTOP
assert(ptrace(PTRACE_SYSCALL, pid, 0, WSTOPSIG(stat)) == 0);

// the child reports the group stop, it is TASK_STOPPED
assert(pid == wait(&stat) && WIFSTOPPED(stat));

// the tracee is STOPPED as requested, not TRACED,
// SIGCONT wakes it up
kill(pid, SIGCONT);

// now the tracee is _running_, and PTRACE_SYSCALL must fail
ret = ptrace(PTRACE_SYSCALL, pid, 0, WSTOPSIG(stat));
printf("should fail: ret=%d %m\n", ret);

return 0;
}

PTRACE_SYSCALL fails, and this is absolutely correct.

Now, let's look at your test-case

> int main(int argc, char **argv)
> {
> int status;
> assert((child_pid = do_fork(child)) > 0);
> assert((ant_pid = do_fork(antagonist)) > 0);
> waitpid(child_pid, &status, 0);
> ptrace(PTRACE_SYSCALL, child_pid, NULL, NULL);
> while(1) {
> if (waitpid(child_pid, &status, 0) <= 0) {
> printf("Errno %d\n", errno);
> exit(EXIT_FAILURE);
> }
> if (WIFSTOPPED(status)) {

WSTOPSIG() should be either SIGCONT or SIGSTOP

> printf("stopped: %d\n", WSTOPSIG(status));
>
> /* This should work, but sometimes it doesn't */
> if (ptrace(PTRACE_SYSCALL, child_pid,
> NULL, WSTOPSIG(status)) < 0) {

This should not work if the tracee reported the group stop (not the
fact it dequeued SIGSTOP) and antagonist() sends SIGCONT in between.

> /* Oddly it works the second time! */
> assert (ptrace(PTRACE_SYSCALL,
> child_pid, NULL, WSTOPSIG(status)) < 0);

Of couse, it _can_ work the second time, antagonist() sends a signal
(SIGCONT or SIGSTOP), the tracee dequeues the signal, and stops to
report this signal.

See?

Oleg.

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