Re: [tip:x86/pti] x86/speculation: Use Indirect Branch Prediction Barrier in context switch

From: Dominik Brodowski
Date: Wed Jan 31 2018 - 02:05:23 EST


On Tue, Jan 30, 2018 at 02:39:45PM -0800, tip-bot for Tim Chen wrote:
> Commit-ID: 18bf3c3ea8ece8f03b6fc58508f2dfd23c7711c7
> Gitweb: https://git.kernel.org/tip/18bf3c3ea8ece8f03b6fc58508f2dfd23c7711c7
> Author: Tim Chen <tim.c.chen@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> AuthorDate: Mon, 29 Jan 2018 22:04:47 +0000
> Committer: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> CommitDate: Tue, 30 Jan 2018 23:09:21 +0100
>
> x86/speculation: Use Indirect Branch Prediction Barrier in context switch
>
> Flush indirect branches when switching into a process that marked itself
> non dumpable. This protects high value processes like gpg better,
> without having too high performance overhead.

For the record, I am still opposed to limit this to non-dumpable processes.
Whether a process needs protection by IBPB on context switches is a
different question to whether a process should be allowed to be dumped,
though the former may be a superset of the latter. In my opinion, IBPB
should be enabled on all context switches to userspace processes, until we
have a clear mitigation strategy for userspace against Spectre-v2 designed
and implemented.

Thanks,
Dominik

--------------------------
From: Dominik Brodowski <linux@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wed, 31 Jan 2018 07:43:12 +0100
Subject: [PATCH] x86/speculation: Do not limit Indirect Branch Prediction Barrier to non-dumpable processes

Whether a process needs protection by IBPB on context switches is a
different question to whether a process should be allowed to be dumped,
though the former may be a superset of the latter. Enable IBPB on all
context switches to a different userspace process, until we have a clear
mitigation strategy for userspace against Spectre-v2 designed and
implemented.

Signed-off-by: Dominik Brodowski <linux@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>

diff --git a/arch/x86/mm/tlb.c b/arch/x86/mm/tlb.c
index 012d02624848..f54897b68b16 100644
--- a/arch/x86/mm/tlb.c
+++ b/arch/x86/mm/tlb.c
@@ -255,19 +255,13 @@ void switch_mm_irqs_off(struct mm_struct *prev, struct mm_struct *next,
* predictor when switching between processes. This stops
* one process from doing Spectre-v2 attacks on another.
*
- * As an optimization, flush indirect branches only when
- * switching into processes that disable dumping. This
- * protects high value processes like gpg, without having
- * too high performance overhead. IBPB is *expensive*!
- *
* This will not flush branches when switching into kernel
* threads. It will also not flush if we switch to idle
* thread and back to the same process. It will flush if we
- * switch to a different non-dumpable process.
+ * switch to a different user process.
*/
if (tsk && tsk->mm &&
- tsk->mm->context.ctx_id != last_ctx_id &&
- get_dumpable(tsk->mm) != SUID_DUMP_USER)
+ tsk->mm->context.ctx_id != last_ctx_id)
indirect_branch_prediction_barrier();

if (IS_ENABLED(CONFIG_VMAP_STACK)) {