Critical · published August 8, 2026
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
libceph: fix two unsafe bare decodes in decode_lockers()
decode_lockers() in cls_lock_client.c contains two bare decode operations
that allow a malicious or compromised OSD to trigger slab-out-of-bounds
reads:
1. ceph_decode_32(p) at the num_lockers field has no preceding bounds
check. ceph_start_decoding() accepts struct_len=0 as valid -- the
internal ceph_decode_need(p, end, 0, bad) always passes -- so when an
OSD sends struct_len=0, ceph_start_decoding() returns success with
p == end. The immediately following bare ceph_decode_32(p) then reads
4 bytes past the validated buffer boundary. The garbage value is
passed directly to kzalloc_objs() as the locker count.
The sibling function decode_watchers() in osd_client.c already uses
ceph_decode_32_safe() after its own ceph_start_decoding() call.
decode_lockers() was the only site using the bare variant.
2. ceph_decode_8(p) after the decode_locker() loop has no preceding
bounds check. If an OSD crafts num_lockers such that the loop
advances p exactly to end, the subsequent bare ceph_decode_8(p) reads
one byte past the validated buffer boundary. The result is passed
directly into *type, which is used as a lock type discriminator by
callers, giving an OSD-controlled one-byte OOB read with direct
influence over the lock type field.
Fix both by replacing bare operations with their safe variants:
ceph_decode_32(p) -> ceph_decode_32_safe(p, end, *num_lockers,
err_inval)
ceph_decode_8(p) -> ceph_decode_8_safe(p, end, *type,
err_free_lockers)
The goto targets differ intentionally:
err_inval: is a new label returning -EINVAL directly. It is used for
the pre-allocation failure path where *lockers is not yet allocated
and must not be passed to ceph_free_lockers().
err_free_lockers: is the existing label. It is used for the
post-allocation failure path where *lockers is allocated and must
be freed.
ret is set to -EINVAL before ceph_decode_8_safe() so that
err_free_lockers returns the correct error code on bounds violation.
Without this, err_free_lockers would return a stale ret value (0 from
the successful decode_locker() loop), silently swallowing the error.
-EINVAL is correct for both failure paths. The data received from the
OSD is structurally malformed. -ENOMEM would misrepresent the failure
class to callers and to stable@ backporters triaging error paths.
Attacker model: a malicious or compromised OSD in a multi-tenant Ceph
deployment can trigger this against any kernel client that issues the
lock.get_info class method (e.g. during RBD exclusive lock acquisition).
[ idryomov: trim changelog, formatting ]