[RFC v3 PATCH 0/2] Introduce Security Version to EFI Stub

Ingo Molnar
2017-12-06T18:37:34Z

* Gary Lin <glin@suse.com> wrote:

> On Tue, Dec 05, 2017 at 04:14:26PM -0500, Josh Boyer wrote:
> > On Tue, Dec 5, 2017 at 5:01 AM, Gary Lin <glin@suse.com> wrote:
> > > The series of patches introduce Security Version to EFI stub.
> > >
> > > Security Version is a monotonically increasing number and designed to
> > > prevent the user from loading an insecure kernel accidentally. The
> > > bootloader maintains a list of security versions corresponding to
> > > different distributions. After fixing a critical vulnerability, the
> > > distribution kernel maintainer bumps the "version", and the bootloader
> > > updates the list automatically. When the user tries to load a kernel
> > > with a lower security version, the bootloader shows a warning prompt
> > > to notify the user the potential risk.
> >
> > If a distribution releases a kernel with a higher security version and
> > that it automatically updated on boot, what happens if that kernel
> > contains a different bug that causes it to fail to boot or break
> > critical functionality? At that point, the user's machine would be in
> > a state where the higher security version is enforced but the only
> > kernel that provides that is broken. Wouldn't that make a bad
> > situation even worse by now requiring manual acceptance of the older
> > SV kernel boot physically at the machine?
> >
> > I feel like I'm missing a detail here or something.
> >
> If the new kernel fails to boot, then the user has to choose the kernel
> manually anyway, and there will be an option in the warning prompt to
> lower SV.

And what if the firmware does not support a lowering of the SV?

Thanks,

Ingo