In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

tracing: Fix crash in print_graph_function_event()

tracing_set_tracer() assigns the flags of the newly selected tracer with:

tr->current_trace_flags = t->flags ? : t->tracer->flags;

If the new tracer defines neither static flags nor default flags, like hwlat, irqsoff or wakeup, add_tracer() has no per instance flags copy for it, and both operands are NULL, so tr->current_trace_flags ends up being NULL as well.

The ring buffer is not cleared when switching tracers: it is reset inside tracer_init(), after current_trace_flags was already assigned. If the buffer still holds function_graph entries of the previous tracer, printing one of them dereferences the NULL pointer. This was hit by cat trace during an ftrace stress test:

BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000000 #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode RIP: 0010:print_graph_function_event+0xe/0x20 Call Trace: s_show+0x4d/0x110 seq_read_iter+0x2d4/0x490 seq_read+0x130/0x170 vfs_read+0xb5/0x370 ksys_read+0x6d/0xe0 do_syscall_64+0xbc/0x450

The snapshot buffer is not reset at all, so this can be reproduced without a race:

echo function_graph > /sys/kernel/tracing/current_tracer echo 1 > /sys/kernel/tracing/snapshot echo hwlat > /sys/kernel/tracing/current_tracer cat /sys/kernel/tracing/snapshot

Rather than teaching every user of tr->current_trace_flags about this corner case, make sure it is ne…

Affected: Ubuntu:Pro:14.04:LTS: linux, Ubuntu:Pro:14.04:LTS: linux-aws, Ubuntu:Pro:14.04:LTS: linux-azure, Ubuntu:Pro:14.04:LTS: linux-lts-xenial, Ubuntu:Pro:16.04:LTS: linux, Ubuntu:Pro:16.04:LTS: linux-aws, Ubuntu:Pro:16.04:LTS: linux-aws-hwe, Ubuntu:Pro:16.04:LTS: linux-azure, Ubuntu:Pro:16.04:LTS: linux-gcp, Ubuntu:Pro:16.04:LTS: linux-hwe and 257 more

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: tracing: Fix crash in print_graph_function_event() tracing_set_tracer() assigns the flags of the newly selected tracer with: tr->current_trace_flags = t->flags ? : t->tracer->flags; If the new tracer defines neither static flags nor default flags, like hwlat, irqsoff or wakeup, add_tracer() has no per instance flags copy for it, and both operands are NULL, so tr->current_trace_flags ends up being NULL as well. The ring buffer is not cleared when switching tracers: it is reset inside tracer_init(), after current_trace_flags was already assigned. If the buffer still holds function_graph entries of the previous tracer, printing one of them dereferences the NULL pointer. This was hit by cat trace during an ftrace stress test: BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000000 #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode RIP: 0010:print_graph_function_event+0xe/0x20 Call Trace: s_show+0x4d/0x110 seq_read_iter+0x2d4/0x490 seq_read+0x130/0x170 vfs_read+0xb5/0x370 ksys_read+0x6d/0xe0 do_syscall_64+0xbc/0x450 The snapshot buffer is not reset at all, so this can be reproduced without a race: echo function_graph > /sys/kernel/tracing/current_tracer echo 1 > /sys/kernel/tracing/snapshot echo hwlat > /sys/kernel/tracing/current_tracer cat /sys/kernel/tracing/snapshot Rather than teaching every user of tr->current_trace_flags about this corner case, make sure it is never NULL:…