stable.vger.kernel.org archive mirror
 help / color / mirror / Atom feed
From: Theodore Ts'o <tytso@mit.edu>
To: Ben Hutchings <ben@decadent.org.uk>
Cc: Linux Kernel Developers List <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>,
	ewust@umich.edu, zakir@umich.edu, nadiah@cs.ucsd.edu,
	jhalderm@umich.edu, stable@vger.kernel.org
Subject: Re: [PATCH 07/12] random: use the arch-specific rng in xfer_secondary_pool
Date: Sat, 7 Jul 2012 21:41:24 -0400	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <20120708014124.GA3809@thunk.org> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <1341709606.25597.182.camel@deadeye.wl.decadent.org.uk>

On Sun, Jul 08, 2012 at 02:06:46AM +0100, Ben Hutchings wrote:
> 
> Surely the number of random bytes being added is i * sizeof(long), not
> sizeof(u.hwrand)?
> 

Meh; Kees Cook has made the same observation.  Basically, in the
unlikely case where RDRAND fails, we'll end up mixing in stack
garbage.  It's not a security vulnerability, since the contents of the
entropy pool never gets exposed.  In fact, one could argue that mixing
in some unknown garbage from the kernel stack might actually help a
little; but it can't hurt.

					- Ted

  reply	other threads:[~2012-07-08  1:41 UTC|newest]

Thread overview: 20+ messages / expand[flat|nested]  mbox.gz  Atom feed  top
     [not found] <1341614704-24965-1-git-send-email-tytso@mit.edu>
2012-07-06 22:44 ` [PATCH 02/12] random: make 'add_interrupt_randomness()' do something sane Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-08  2:01   ` Ben Hutchings
2012-07-06 22:44 ` [PATCH 03/12] random: use lockless techniques in the interrupt path Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-06 22:44 ` [PATCH 04/12] random: create add_device_randomness() interface Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-06 22:44 ` [PATCH 05/12] usb: feed USB device information to the /dev/random driver Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-06 23:02   ` Jonathan Nieder
2012-07-06 23:18     ` Greg KH
2012-07-06 23:26     ` Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-07  1:08       ` Jonathan Nieder
2012-07-06 22:44 ` [PATCH 06/12] net: feed /dev/random with the MAC address when registering a device Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-06 22:44 ` [PATCH 07/12] random: use the arch-specific rng in xfer_secondary_pool Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-07 17:11   ` [PATCH] random: only use gathered bytes from arch_get_random_long Kees Cook
2012-07-07 18:23     ` Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-07 23:20       ` Kees Cook
2012-07-08  1:06   ` [PATCH 07/12] random: use the arch-specific rng in xfer_secondary_pool Ben Hutchings
2012-07-08  1:41     ` Theodore Ts'o [this message]
2012-07-08  2:06       ` Ben Hutchings
2012-07-06 22:45 ` [PATCH 08/12] random: add new get_random_bytes_arch() function Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-06 22:45 ` [PATCH 11/12] rtc: wm831x: Feed the write counter into device_add_randomness() Theodore Ts'o
2012-07-06 22:45 ` [PATCH 12/12] mfd: wm831x: Feed the device UUID " Theodore Ts'o

Reply instructions:

You may reply publicly to this message via plain-text email
using any one of the following methods:

* Save the following mbox file, import it into your mail client,
  and reply-to-all from there: mbox

  Avoid top-posting and favor interleaved quoting:
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Interleaved_style

* Reply using the --to, --cc, and --in-reply-to
  switches of git-send-email(1):

  git send-email \
    --in-reply-to=20120708014124.GA3809@thunk.org \
    --to=tytso@mit.edu \
    --cc=ben@decadent.org.uk \
    --cc=ewust@umich.edu \
    --cc=jhalderm@umich.edu \
    --cc=linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org \
    --cc=nadiah@cs.ucsd.edu \
    --cc=stable@vger.kernel.org \
    --cc=zakir@umich.edu \
    /path/to/YOUR_REPLY

  https://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-send-email.html

* If your mail client supports setting the In-Reply-To header
  via mailto: links, try the mailto: link
Be sure your reply has a Subject: header at the top and a blank line before the message body.
This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox;
as well as URLs for NNTP newsgroup(s).