[PATCH] kexec_file: ima: allow loading a kernel with its IMA signature verified

Coiby Xu coxu at redhat.com
Thu Jul 13 19:29:56 PDT 2023


On Thu, Jul 13, 2023 at 05:59:38PM +0000, Eric Snowberg wrote:
>
>
>> On Jul 12, 2023, at 12:31 PM, Mimi Zohar <zohar at linux.ibm.com> wrote:
>>
>> [Cc'ing the LSM mailing list.]
>>
>> On Tue, 2023-07-11 at 11:16 +0800, Coiby Xu wrote:
>>> When IMA has verified the signature of the kernel image, kexec'ing this
>>> kernel should be allowed.
>>>
>>> Fixes: af16df54b89d ("ima: force signature verification when CONFIG_KEXEC_SIG is configured")
>>> Signed-off-by: Coiby Xu <coxu at redhat.com>
>>
>> The original commit  29d3c1c8dfe7 ("kexec: Allow kexec_file() with
>> appropriate IMA policy when locked down") was not in lieu of the PE-
>> COFF signature, but allowed using the IMA signature on other
>> architectures.
>>
>> Currently on systems with both PE-COFF and IMA signatures, both
>> signatures are verified, assuming the file is in the IMA policy.  If
>> either signature verification fails, the kexec fails.
>>
>> With this patch, only the IMA signature would be verified.
>>
>>> ---
>>> kernel/kexec_file.c | 14 +++++++++-----
>>> 1 file changed, 9 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)
>>>
>>> diff --git a/kernel/kexec_file.c b/kernel/kexec_file.c
>>> index 881ba0d1714c..96fce001fbc0 100644
>>> --- a/kernel/kexec_file.c
>>> +++ b/kernel/kexec_file.c
>>> @@ -162,6 +162,13 @@ kimage_validate_signature(struct kimage *image)
>>> 	ret = kexec_image_verify_sig(image, image->kernel_buf,
>>> 				     image->kernel_buf_len);
>>> 	if (ret) {
>>> +		/*
>>> +		 * If the kernel image already has its IMA signature verified, permit it.
>>> +		 */
>>> +		if (ima_appraise_signature(READING_KEXEC_IMAGE)) {
>>> +			pr_notice("The kernel image already has its IMA signature verified.\n");
>>> +			return 0;
>>> +		}
>
>The issue I see here is ret could be many things, for example it could be
>-EKEYREJECTED, meaning it was contained on a revocation list.  With this patch
>the revocation could be overruled if the image was IMA signed with a different
>key.  Do we really want to add the ability to overrule a revocation?

Thanks for raising the concern! I haven't thought about this case of the
key being in a revocation list. If the IMA signature comes from a
distribution, the distribution should also blocklist the IMA key when
the PE-COFF signature key is added to the revocation list. If the IMA
signature is from an end-user, I think the user wants to pass the
verification in this case.

Or how about only allowing IMA signature when EFI runtime services are
disabled?  Another reason I am yet to add to the commit message is a
real-time kernel currently disables EFI runtime services for latency
issues so it can't access the MOK keys to verify the PECOFF signature.




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