From: Andrei Vagin <avagin@google.com>
To: Thomas Gleixner <tglx@kernel.org>, Ingo Molnar <mingo@redhat.com>,
Borislav Petkov <bp@alien8.de>,
"Chang S. Bae" <chang.seok.bae@intel.com>
Cc: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org, criu@lists.linux.dev,
Dave Hansen <dave.hansen@linux.intel.com>,
x86@kernel.org, Andrei Vagin <avagin@google.com>,
Alexander Mikhalitsyn <alexander@mihalicyn.com>,
"H. Peter Anvin" <hpa@zytor.com>
Subject: [PATCH 4/8] x86/fpu: Document reasoning of FX-only fallback
Date: Mon, 17 Aug 2026 04:20:44 +0000 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <20260817042048.1579415-5-avagin@google.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20260817042048.1579415-1-avagin@google.com>
Add a comment to check_xstate_in_sigframe() to explain reasoning behind
falling back to the FX-only state when signal frame metadata is
inconsistent.
The fallback is intended to preserve backward compatibility with legacy
user-space processes that are not aware of XSAVE states and might only
fill or copy just the legacy FP state.
This fallback is dangerous as it can trigger silent corruptions of
user-space state by resetting extended registers if the process was
using them but the frame metadata was malformed.
Reviewed-by: Alexander Mikhalitsyn <alexander@mihalicyn.com>
Signed-off-by: Andrei Vagin <avagin@google.com>
---
arch/x86/kernel/fpu/signal.c | 8 ++++++++
1 file changed, 8 insertions(+)
diff --git a/arch/x86/kernel/fpu/signal.c b/arch/x86/kernel/fpu/signal.c
index 6a14b528ac7f..85021c5ea649 100644
--- a/arch/x86/kernel/fpu/signal.c
+++ b/arch/x86/kernel/fpu/signal.c
@@ -54,6 +54,14 @@ static inline bool check_xstate_in_sigframe(struct fxregs_state __user *buf_fx,
if (likely(magic2 == FP_XSTATE_MAGIC2))
return true;
err_setfx:
+ /*
+ * The fallback to FX-only state is used to preserve backward
+ * compatibility with user-space processes that are not aware of xsave
+ * states.
+ *
+ * In all other cases, returning false (to trigger SIGSEGV) is
+ * preferred to avoid silent user-space state corruption.
+ */
trace_x86_fpu_xstate_check_failed(x86_task_fpu(current));
/* Set the parameters for fx only state */
--
2.55.0.691.gc56d675ccc-goog
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2026-08-17 4:21 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 9+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2026-08-17 4:20 [PATCH v4 0/8] x86/fpu: Restore and reinforce signal frame portability Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 1/8] x86/fpu: Document " Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 2/8] x86/fpu: Clean up and rename variables in signal frame handling Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 3/8] x86/fpu: Split __fpu_restore_sig to extract compat path Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` Andrei Vagin [this message]
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 5/8] selftests/x86: Add a test for signal frame FPU portability Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 6/8] x86/fpu: Fix potential underflow in xstate_calculate_size() Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 7/8] x86/fpu: Pre-fault only required size of xstate buffer Andrei Vagin
2026-08-17 4:20 ` [PATCH 8/8] selftests/x86: Add a sigframe insufficient xstate_size test Andrei Vagin
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