Re: [PATCH v2 0/2] Introduce the pkill_on_warn parameter

[Kaiwan N Billimoria <kaiwan.billimoria@gmail.com>]

On Thu, 2021-10-28 at 02:32 +0300, Alexander Popov wrote:
> [...]
> 
> From a security point of view, kernel warning messages provide a lot of
> useful information for attackers. Many GNU/Linux distributions allow
> unprivileged users to read the kernel log, so attackers use kernel
> warning infoleak in vulnerability exploits. 
At the risk of being too simplistic, if the intention is to cut down infoleaks,
why not simply have a config (and/or sysctl) to toggle it - both at kernel build
as well as at runtime via a sysctl.

A minimal starting attempt at this, definitely incomplete (i've not actually written
the config anywhere, sorry, I'd just like to propose this as an idea for now) could
be something like this? (Am calling the kconfig CONFIG_TERSE_DIAGS_ONWARN):

---
 kernel/panic.c | 11 +++++++----
 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/kernel/panic.c b/kernel/panic.c
index cefd7d82366f..bbf00b0a8110 100644
--- a/kernel/panic.c
+++ b/kernel/panic.c
@@ -587,10 +587,8 @@ void __warn(const char *file, int line, void *caller, unsigned taint,
    if (args)
        vprintk(args->fmt, args->args);
 
-   print_modules();
-
-   if (regs)
-       show_regs(regs);
+   if (IS_ENABLED(CONFIG_TERSE_DIAGS_ONWARN))
+       return;
 
    if (panic_on_warn) {
        /*
@@ -603,6 +601,11 @@ void __warn(const char *file, int line, void *caller, unsigned taint,
        panic("panic_on_warn set ...\n");
    }   
 
+   print_modules();
+
+   if (regs)
+       show_regs(regs);
+
    if (!regs)
        dump_stack();
 
-- 
2.25.1


Further, am unsure precisely which portions of diagnostic output would be useful
to retain when the config's on. Of course, this "patch" is very premature. Of course,
am open to suggestions on all of this,
Regards