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diff --git a/Documentation/mm/page_table_check.rst b/Documentation/mm/page_table_check.rst new file mode 100644 index 000000000..d19ca356b --- /dev/null +++ b/Documentation/mm/page_table_check.rst @@ -0,0 +1,75 @@ +.. SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0 + +.. _page_table_check: + +================ +Page Table Check +================ + +Introduction +============ + +Page table check allows to harden the kernel by ensuring that some types of +the memory corruptions are prevented. + +Page table check performs extra verifications at the time when new pages become +accessible from the userspace by getting their page table entries (PTEs PMDs +etc.) added into the table. + +In case of detected corruption, the kernel is crashed. There is a small +performance and memory overhead associated with the page table check. Therefore, +it is disabled by default, but can be optionally enabled on systems where the +extra hardening outweighs the performance costs. Also, because page table check +is synchronous, it can help with debugging double map memory corruption issues, +by crashing kernel at the time wrong mapping occurs instead of later which is +often the case with memory corruptions bugs. + +Double mapping detection logic +============================== + ++-------------------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ +| Current Mapping | New mapping | Permissions | Rule | ++===================+===================+===================+==================+ +| Anonymous | Anonymous | Read | Allow | ++-------------------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ +| Anonymous | Anonymous | Read / Write | Prohibit | ++-------------------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ +| Anonymous | Named | Any | Prohibit | ++-------------------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ +| Named | Anonymous | Any | Prohibit | ++-------------------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ +| Named | Named | Any | Allow | ++-------------------+-------------------+-------------------+------------------+ + +Enabling Page Table Check +========================= + +Build kernel with: + +- PAGE_TABLE_CHECK=y + Note, it can only be enabled on platforms where ARCH_SUPPORTS_PAGE_TABLE_CHECK + is available. + +- Boot with 'page_table_check=on' kernel parameter. + +Optionally, build kernel with PAGE_TABLE_CHECK_ENFORCED in order to have page +table support without extra kernel parameter. + +Implementation notes +==================== + +We specifically decided not to use VMA information in order to avoid relying on +MM states (except for limited "struct page" info). The page table check is a +separate from Linux-MM state machine that verifies that the user accessible +pages are not falsely shared. + +PAGE_TABLE_CHECK depends on EXCLUSIVE_SYSTEM_RAM. The reason is that without +EXCLUSIVE_SYSTEM_RAM, users are allowed to map arbitrary physical memory +regions into the userspace via /dev/mem. At the same time, pages may change +their properties (e.g., from anonymous pages to named pages) while they are +still being mapped in the userspace, leading to "corruption" detected by the +page table check. + +Even with EXCLUSIVE_SYSTEM_RAM, I/O pages may be still allowed to be mapped via +/dev/mem. However, these pages are always considered as named pages, so they +won't break the logic used in the page table check. |