mptcp: fix slab-use-after-free in __inet_lookup_established

The ehash table lookups are lockless and rely on SLAB_TYPESAFE_BY_RCU to guarantee socket memory stability during RCU read-side critical sections. Both tcp_prot and tcpv6_prot have their slab caches created with this flag via proto_register().

However, MPTCP's mptcp_subflow_init() copies tcpv6_prot into tcpv6_prot_override during inet_init() (fs_initcall, level 5), before inet6_init() (module_init/device_initcall, level 6) has called proto_register(&tcpv6_prot). At that point, tcpv6_prot.slab is still NULL, so tcpv6_prot_override.slab remains NULL permanently.

This causes MPTCP v6 subflow child sockets to be allocated via kmalloc (falling into kmalloc-4k) instead of the TCPv6 slab cache. The kmalloc-4k cache lacks SLAB_TYPESAFE_BY_RCU, so when these sockets are freed without SOCK_RCU_FREE (which is cleared for child sockets by design), the memory can be immediately reused. Concurrent ehash lookups under rcu_read_lock can then access freed memory, triggering a slab-use-after-free in __inet_lookup_established.

Fix this by splitting the IPv6-specific initialization out of mptcp_subflow_init() into a new mptcp_subflow_v6_init(), called from mptcp_proto_v6_init() before protocol registration. This ensures tcpv6_prot_override.slab correctly inherits the SLAB_TYPESAFE_BY_RCU slab cache.

---
 net/mptcp/protocol.c |  2 ++
 net/mptcp/protocol.h |  1 +
 net/mptcp/subflow.c  | 15 +++++++++------
 3 files changed, 12 insertions(+), 6 deletions(-)

index 65c3bb8016f4..614c3f583ca0 100644
@@ -4660,6 +4660,8 @@ int __init mptcp_proto_v6_init(void)
 {
 	int err;
 
+	mptcp_subflow_v6_init();
+
 	mptcp_v6_prot = mptcp_prot;
 	strscpy(mptcp_v6_prot.name, "MPTCPv6", sizeof(mptcp_v6_prot.name));
 	mptcp_v6_prot.slab = NULL;

index 0bd1ee860316..ec15e503da8b 100644
@@ -875,6 +875,7 @@ static inline void mptcp_subflow_tcp_fallback(struct sock *sk,
 void __init mptcp_proto_init(void);
 #if IS_ENABLED(CONFIG_MPTCP_IPV6)
 int __init mptcp_proto_v6_init(void);
+void __init mptcp_subflow_v6_init(void);
 #endif
 
 struct sock *mptcp_sk_clone_init(const struct sock *sk,

index 6716970693e9..4ff5863aa9fd 100644
@@ -2165,7 +2165,15 @@ void __init mptcp_subflow_init(void)
 	tcp_prot_override.psock_update_sk_prot = NULL;
 #endif
 
+	mptcp_diag_subflow_init(&subflow_ulp_ops);
+
+	if (tcp_register_ulp(&subflow_ulp_ops) != 0)
+		panic("MPTCP: failed to register subflows to ULP\n");
+}
+
 #if IS_ENABLED(CONFIG_MPTCP_IPV6)
+void __init mptcp_subflow_v6_init(void)
+{
 	/* In struct mptcp_subflow_request_sock, we assume the TCP request sock
 	 * structures for v4 and v6 have the same size. It should not changed in
 	 * the future but better to make sure to be warned if it is no longer

@@ -2204,10 +2212,5 @@ void __init mptcp_subflow_init(void)
 	/* Disable sockmap processing for subflows */
 	tcpv6_prot_override.psock_update_sk_prot = NULL;
 #endif
-#endif
-
-	mptcp_diag_subflow_init(&subflow_ulp_ops);
-
-	if (tcp_register_ulp(&subflow_ulp_ops) != 0)
-		panic("MPTCP: failed to register subflows to ULP\n");
 }
+#endif

2.43.0

Hi Jiayuan,

Thank you for your modifications, that's great!

Our CI did some validations and here is its report:

- KVM Validation: normal (except selftest_mptcp_join): Success! ✅
- KVM Validation: normal (only selftest_mptcp_join): Success! ✅
- KVM Validation: debug (except selftest_mptcp_join): Unstable: 2 failed test(s): packetdrill_dss packetdrill_fastopen ⚠️
- KVM Validation: debug (only selftest_mptcp_join): Success! ✅
- KVM Validation: btf-normal (only bpftest_all): Success! ✅
- KVM Validation: btf-debug (only bpftest_all): Success! ✅
- Task: https://github.com/multipath-tcp/mptcp_net-next/actions/runs/24029252526

Initiator: Matthieu Baerts (NGI0)
Commits: https://github.com/multipath-tcp/mptcp_net-next/commits/269f5127d03d
Patchwork: https://patchwork.kernel.org/project/mptcp/list/?series=1077546

If there are some issues, you can reproduce them using the same environment as the one used by the CI thanks to a docker image, e.g.:

    $ cd [kernel source code]
    $ docker run -v "${PWD}:${PWD}:rw" -w "${PWD}" --privileged --rm -it \
        --pull always mptcp/mptcp-upstream-virtme-docker:latest \
        auto-normal

For more details:

https://github.com/multipath-tcp/mptcp-upstream-virtme-docker

Please note that despite all the efforts that have been already done to have a stable tests suite when executed on a public CI like here, it is possible some reported issues are not due to your modifications. Still, do not hesitate to help us improve that ;-)

Cheers,
MPTCP GH Action bot
Bot operated by Matthieu Baerts (NGI0 Core)

Hi Jiayuan,

Thank you for this v2, it looks good to me:

@Netdev maintainers: this patch can be applied in 'net' directly.

Cheers,
Matt

Sponsored by the NGI0 Core fund.