[PATCH 6.18 132/175] macvlan: fix error recovery in macvlan_common_newlink()

Greg Kroah-Hartman
2026-02-09T14:34:18Z

From: Eric Dumazet <edumazet@google.com>

[ Upstream commit f8db6475a83649689c087a8f52486fcc53e627e9 ]

valis provided a nice repro to crash the kernel:

ip link add p1 type veth peer p2
ip link set address 00:00:00:00:00:20 dev p1
ip link set up dev p1
ip link set up dev p2

ip link add mv0 link p2 type macvlan mode source
ip link add invalid% link p2 type macvlan mode source macaddr add 00:00:00:00:00:20

ping -c1 -I p1 1.2.3.4

He also gave a very detailed analysis:

<quote valis>

The issue is triggered when a new macvlan link is created with
MACVLAN_MODE_SOURCE mode and MACVLAN_MACADDR_ADD (or
MACVLAN_MACADDR_SET) parameter, lower device already has a macvlan
port and register_netdevice() called from macvlan_common_newlink()
fails (e.g. because of the invalid link name).

In this case macvlan_hash_add_source is called from
macvlan_change_sources() / macvlan_common_newlink():

This adds a reference to vlan to the port's vlan_source_hash using
macvlan_source_entry.

vlan is a pointer to the priv data of the link that is being created.

When register_netdevice() fails, the error is returned from
macvlan_newlink() to rtnl_newlink_create():

if (ops->newlink)
err = ops->newlink(dev, &params, extack);
else
err = register_netdevice(dev);
if (err < 0) {
free_netdev(dev);
goto out;
}

and free_netdev() is called, causing a kvfree() on the struct
net_device that is still referenced in the source entry attached to
the lower device's macvlan port.

Now all packets sent on the macvlan port with a matching source mac
address will trigger a use-after-free in macvlan_forward_source().

</quote valis>

With all that, my fix is to make sure we call macvlan_flush_sources()
regardless of @create value whenever "goto destroy_macvlan_port;"
path is taken.

Many thanks to valis for following up on this issue.

Fixes: aa5fd0fb7748 ("driver: macvlan: Destroy new macvlan port if macvlan_common_newlink failed.")
Signed-off-by: Eric Dumazet <edumazet@google.com>
Reported-by: valis <sec@valis.email>
Reported-by: syzbot+7182fbe91e58602ec1fe@syzkaller.appspotmail.com
Closes: https: //lore.kernel.org/netdev/695fb1e8.050a0220.1c677c.039f.GAE@google.com/T/#u
Cc: Boudewijn van der Heide <boudewijn@delta-utec.com>
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260129204359.632556-1-edumazet@google.com
Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Sasha Levin <sashal@kernel.org>
---
drivers/net/macvlan.c | 5 +++--
1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/drivers/net/macvlan.c b/drivers/net/macvlan.c
index b4df7e184791d..c509228be84d1 100644
--- a/drivers/net/macvlan.c
+++ b/drivers/net/macvlan.c
@@ -1567,9 +1567,10 @@ int macvlan_common_newlink(struct net_device *dev,
/* the macvlan port may be freed by macvlan_uninit when fail to register.
* so we destroy the macvlan port only when it's valid.
*/
- if (create && macvlan_port_get_rtnl(lowerdev)) {
+ if (macvlan_port_get_rtnl(lowerdev)) {
macvlan_flush_sources(port, vlan);
- macvlan_port_destroy(port->dev);
+ if (create)
+ macvlan_port_destroy(port->dev);
}
return err;
}
--
2.51.0