Re: [PATCH v11 5/9] x86/efi: Disable LASS while mapping the EFI runtime services

[Ard Biesheuvel <ardb@kernel.org>]

On Fri, 7 Nov 2025 at 10:27, H. Peter Anvin <hpa@zytor.com> wrote:
>
> On November 7, 2025 1:22:30 AM PST, Ard Biesheuvel <ardb@kernel.org> wrote:
> >On Fri, 7 Nov 2025 at 10:04, Peter Zijlstra <peterz@infradead.org> wrote:
> >>
> >> On Fri, Oct 31, 2025 at 11:12:53AM -0700, Dave Hansen wrote:
> >>
> >> > But there's a pretty broad set of things that are for "security" that
> >> > aren't necessary while you're just running trusted ring0 code:
> >> >
> >> >  * SMAP/SMEP
> >> >  * CR pinning itself
> >> >  * MSR_IA32_SPEC_CTRL
> >> >  * MSR_IA32_TSX_CTRL
> >> >
> >> > They just haven't mattered until now because they don't have any
> >> > practical effect until you actually have code running on _PAGE_USER
> >> > mappings trying to attack the kernel.
> >>
> >> But that's just the thing EFI is *NOT* trusted! We're basically
> >> disabling all security features (not listed above are CET and CFI) to
> >> run this random garbage we have no control over.
> >>
> >> How about we just flat out refuse EFI runtime services? What are they
> >> actually needed for? Why are we bending over backwards and subverting
> >> our security for this stuff?
> >
> >On x86, it is mostly the EFI variable services that user space has
> >come to rely on, not only for setting the boot path (which typically
> >happens only once at installation time, when the path to GRUB is set
> >as the first boot option). Unfortunately, the systemd folks have taken
> >a liking to this feature too, and have started storing things in
> >there.
> >
> >There is also PRM, which is much worse, as it permits devices in the
> >ACPI namespace to call firmware routines that are mapped privileged in
> >the OS address space in the same way. I objected to this at the time,
> >and asked for a facility where we could at least mark such code as
> >unprivileged (and run it as such) but this was ignored, as Intel and
> >MS had already sealed the deal and put this into production. This is
> >much worse than typical EFI routines, as the PRM code is ODM/OEM code
> >rather than something that comes from the upstream EFI implementation.
> >It is basically a dumping ground for code that used to run in SMM
> >because it was too ugly to run anywhere else. </rant>
> >
> >It would be nice if we could
> >
> >a) Get rid of SetVirtualAddressMap(), which is another insane hack
> >that should never have been supported on 64-bit systems. On arm64, we
> >no longer call it unless there is a specific need for it (some Ampere
> >Altra systems with buggy firmware will crash otherwise). On x86,
> >though, it might be tricky because there so much buggy firmware.
> >Perhaps we should phase it out by checking for the UEFI version, so
> >that future systems will avoid it. This would mean, however, that EFI
> >code remains in the low user address space, which may not be what you
> >want (unless we do c) perhaps?)
> >
> >b) Run EFI runtime calls in a sandbox VM - there was a PoC implemented
> >for arm64 a couple of years ago, but it was very intrusive and the ARM
> >intern in question went on to do more satisyfing work.
> >
> >c) Unmap the kernel KPTI style while the runtime calls are in
> >progress? This should be rather straight-forward, although it might
> >not help a lot as the code in question still runs privileged.
>
> Firmware update is a big one.

Firmware update does not run under the OS.