[PATCH] kvm/vfio: Fix potential deadlock on vfio group_lock

Yi Liu
2023-01-20T15:05:33Z

Currently it is possible that the final put of a KVM reference comes from
vfio during its device close operation. This occurs while the vfio group
lock is held; however, if the vfio device is still in the kvm device list,
then the following call chain could result in a deadlock:

VFIO holds group->group_lock/group_rwsem
-> kvm_put_kvm
-> kvm_destroy_vm
-> kvm_destroy_devices
-> kvm_vfio_destroy
-> kvm_vfio_file_set_kvm
-> vfio_file_set_kvm
-> try to hold group->group_lock/group_rwsem

The key function is the kvm_destroy_devices() which triggers destroy cb
of kvm_device_ops. It calls back to vfio and try to hold group_lock. So
if this path doesn't call back to vfio, this dead lock would be fixed.
Actually, there is a way for it. KVM provides another point to free the
kvm-vfio device which is the point when the device file descriptor is
closed. This can be achieved by providing the release cb instead of the
destroy cb. Also rename kvm_vfio_destroy() to be kvm_vfio_release().

/*
* Destroy is responsible for freeing dev.
*
* Destroy may be called before or after destructors are called
* on emulated I/O regions, depending on whether a reference is
* held by a vcpu or other kvm component that gets destroyed
* after the emulated I/O.
*/
void (*destroy)(struct kvm_device *dev);

/*
* Release is an alternative method to free the device. It is
* called when the device file descriptor is closed. Once
* release is called, the destroy method will not be called
* anymore as the device is removed from the device list of
* the VM. kvm->lock is held.
*/
void (*release)(struct kvm_device *dev);

Fixes: 421cfe6596f6 ("vfio: remove VFIO_GROUP_NOTIFY_SET_KVM")
Reported-by: Alex Williamson <alex.williamson@redhat.com>
Suggested-by: Kevin Tian <kevin.tian@intel.com>
Reviewed-by: Jason Gunthorpe <jgg@nvidia.com>
Signed-off-by: Yi Liu <yi.l.liu@intel.com>
---
virt/kvm/vfio.c | 4 ++--
1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)

diff --git a/virt/kvm/vfio.c b/virt/kvm/vfio.c
index 495ceabffe88..e94f3ea718e5 100644
--- a/virt/kvm/vfio.c
+++ b/virt/kvm/vfio.c
@@ -336,7 +336,7 @@ static int kvm_vfio_has_attr(struct kvm_device *dev,
return -ENXIO;
}

-static void kvm_vfio_destroy(struct kvm_device *dev)
+static void kvm_vfio_release(struct kvm_device *dev)
{
struct kvm_vfio *kv = dev->private;
struct kvm_vfio_group *kvg, *tmp;
@@ -363,7 +363,7 @@ static int kvm_vfio_create(struct kvm_device *dev, u32 type);
static struct kvm_device_ops kvm_vfio_ops = {
.name = "kvm-vfio",
.create = kvm_vfio_create,
- .destroy = kvm_vfio_destroy,
+ .release = kvm_vfio_release,
.set_attr = kvm_vfio_set_attr,
.has_attr = kvm_vfio_has_attr,
};
--
2.34.1