Vulnerabilities > CVE-2024-26837 - Race Condition vulnerability in Linux Kernel

047910
CVSS 4.7 - MEDIUM
Attack vector
LOCAL
Attack complexity
HIGH
Privileges required
LOW
Confidentiality impact
NONE
Integrity impact
NONE
Availability impact
HIGH
local
high complexity
linux
CWE-362

Summary

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: bridge: switchdev: Skip MDB replays of deferred events on offload Before this change, generation of the list of MDB events to replay would race against the creation of new group memberships, either from the IGMP/MLD snooping logic or from user configuration. While new memberships are immediately visible to walkers of br->mdb_list, the notification of their existence to switchdev event subscribers is deferred until a later point in time. So if a replay list was generated during a time that overlapped with such a window, it would also contain a replay of the not-yet-delivered event. The driver would thus receive two copies of what the bridge internally considered to be one single event. On destruction of the bridge, only a single membership deletion event was therefore sent. As a consequence of this, drivers which reference count memberships (at least DSA), would be left with orphan groups in their hardware database when the bridge was destroyed. This is only an issue when replaying additions. While deletion events may still be pending on the deferred queue, they will already have been removed from br->mdb_list, so no duplicates can be generated in that scenario. To a user this meant that old group memberships, from a bridge in which a port was previously attached, could be reanimated (in hardware) when the port joined a new bridge, without the new bridge's knowledge. For example, on an mv88e6xxx system, create a snooping bridge and immediately add a port to it: root@infix-06-0b-00:~$ ip link add dev br0 up type bridge mcast_snooping 1 && \ > ip link set dev x3 up master br0 And then destroy the bridge: root@infix-06-0b-00:~$ ip link del dev br0 root@infix-06-0b-00:~$ mvls atu ADDRESS FID STATE Q F 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 a DEV:0 Marvell 88E6393X 33:33:00:00:00:6a 1 static - - 0 . . . . . . . . . . 33:33:ff:87:e4:3f 1 static - - 0 . . . . . . . . . . ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff 1 static - - 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 a root@infix-06-0b-00:~$ The two IPv6 groups remain in the hardware database because the port (x3) is notified of the host's membership twice: once via the original event and once via a replay. Since only a single delete notification is sent, the count remains at 1 when the bridge is destroyed. Then add the same port (or another port belonging to the same hardware domain) to a new bridge, this time with snooping disabled: root@infix-06-0b-00:~$ ip link add dev br1 up type bridge mcast_snooping 0 && \ > ip link set dev x3 up master br1 All multicast, including the two IPv6 groups from br0, should now be flooded, according to the policy of br1. But instead the old memberships are still active in the hardware database, causing the switch to only forward traffic to those groups towards the CPU (port 0). Eliminate the race in two steps: 1. Grab the write-side lock of the MDB while generating the replay list. This prevents new memberships from showing up while we are generating the replay list. But it leaves the scenario in which a deferred event was already generated, but not delivered, before we grabbed the lock. Therefore: 2. Make sure that no deferred version of a replay event is already enqueued to the switchdev deferred queue, before adding it to the replay list, when replaying additions.

Vulnerable Configurations

Part Description Count
OS
Linux
613

Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification (CAPEC)

  • Leveraging Race Conditions
    This attack targets a race condition occurring when multiple processes access and manipulate the same resource concurrently and the outcome of the execution depends on the particular order in which the access takes place. The attacker can leverage a race condition by "running the race", modifying the resource and modifying the normal execution flow. For instance a race condition can occur while accessing a file, the attacker can trick the system by replacing the original file with his version and cause the system to read the malicious file.
  • Leveraging Time-of-Check and Time-of-Use (TOCTOU) Race Conditions
    This attack targets a race condition occurring between the time of check (state) for a resource and the time of use of a resource. The typical example is the file access. The attacker can leverage a file access race condition by "running the race", meaning that he would modify the resource between the first time the target program accesses the file and the time the target program uses the file. During that period of time, the attacker could do something such as replace the file and cause an escalation of privilege.