kthread: Don't allocate kthread_struct for init and umh

If kthread_is_per_cpu runs concurrently with free_kthread_struct the
kthread_struct that was just freed may be read from.

This bug was introduced by commit 40966e316f86 ("kthread: Ensure
struct kthread is present for all kthreads").  When kthread_struct
started to be allocated for all tasks that have PF_KTHREAD set.  This
in turn required the kthread_struct to be freed in kernel_execve and
violated the assumption that kthread_struct will have the same
lifetime as the task.

Looking a bit deeper this only applies to callers of kernel_execve
which is just the init process and the user mode helper processes.
These processes really don't want to be kernel threads but are for
historical reasons.  Mostly that copy_thread does not know how to take
a kernel mode function to the process with for processes without
PF_KTHREAD or PF_IO_WORKER set.

Solve this by not allocating kthread_struct for the init process and
the user mode helper processes.

This is done by adding a kthread member to struct kernel_clone_args.
Setting kthread in fork_idle and kernel_thread.  Adding
user_mode_thread that works like kernel_thread except it does not set
kthread.  In fork only allocating the kthread_struct if .kthread is set.

I have looked at kernel/kthread.c and since commit 40966e316f86
("kthread: Ensure struct kthread is present for all kthreads") there
have been no assumptions added that to_kthread or __to_kthread will
not return NULL.

There are a few callers of to_kthread or __to_kthread that assume a
non-NULL struct kthread pointer will be returned.  These functions are
kthread_data(), kthread_parmme(), kthread_exit(), kthread(),
kthread_park(), kthread_unpark(), kthread_stop().  All of those functions
can reasonably expected to be called when it is know that a task is a
kthread so that assumption seems reasonable.

Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org
Fixes: 40966e316f86 ("kthread: Ensure struct kthread is present for all kthreads")
Reported-by: Максим Кутявин <maximkabox13@gmail.com>
Link: https://lkml.kernel.org/r/20220506141512.516114-1-ebiederm@xmission.com
Signed-off-by: "Eric W. Biederman" <ebiederm@xmission.com>

1 files changed, 4 insertions, 2 deletions

diff --git a/fs/exec.c b/fs/exec.c
index e3e55d5e0be1..75eb6e0ee7b2 100644
--- a/fs/exec.c
+++ b/fs/exec.c
@@ -1308,8 +1308,6 @@ int begin_new_exec(struct linux_binprm * bprm)
 	if (retval)
 		goto out_unlock;
 
-	if (me->flags & PF_KTHREAD)
-		free_kthread_struct(me);
 	me->flags &= ~(PF_RANDOMIZE | PF_FORKNOEXEC | PF_KTHREAD |
 					PF_NOFREEZE | PF_NO_SETAFFINITY);
 	flush_thread();
@@ -1955,6 +1953,10 @@ int kernel_execve(const char *kernel_filename,
 	int fd = AT_FDCWD;
 	int retval;
 
+	if (WARN_ON_ONCE((current->flags & PF_KTHREAD) &&
+			(current->worker_private)))
+		return -EINVAL;
+
 	filename = getname_kernel(kernel_filename);
 	if (IS_ERR(filename))
 		return PTR_ERR(filename);