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rjw1f884582022-01-06 17:20:42 +08001===================
2Speculation Control
3===================
4
5Quite some CPUs have speculation-related misfeatures which are in
6fact vulnerabilities causing data leaks in various forms even across
7privilege domains.
8
9The kernel provides mitigation for such vulnerabilities in various
10forms. Some of these mitigations are compile-time configurable and some
11can be supplied on the kernel command line.
12
13There is also a class of mitigations which are very expensive, but they can
14be restricted to a certain set of processes or tasks in controlled
15environments. The mechanism to control these mitigations is via
16:manpage:`prctl(2)`.
17
18There are two prctl options which are related to this:
19
20 * PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL
21
22 * PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL
23
24PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL
25-----------------------
26
27PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL returns the state of the speculation misfeature
28which is selected with arg2 of prctl(2). The return value uses bits 0-3 with
29the following meaning:
30
31==== ===================== ===================================================
32Bit Define Description
33==== ===================== ===================================================
340 PR_SPEC_PRCTL Mitigation can be controlled per task by
35 PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL.
361 PR_SPEC_ENABLE The speculation feature is enabled, mitigation is
37 disabled.
382 PR_SPEC_DISABLE The speculation feature is disabled, mitigation is
39 enabled.
403 PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE Same as PR_SPEC_DISABLE, but cannot be undone. A
41 subsequent prctl(..., PR_SPEC_ENABLE) will fail.
42==== ===================== ===================================================
43
44If all bits are 0 the CPU is not affected by the speculation misfeature.
45
46If PR_SPEC_PRCTL is set, then the per-task control of the mitigation is
47available. If not set, prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL) for the speculation
48misfeature will fail.
49
50.. _set_spec_ctrl:
51
52PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL
53-----------------------
54
55PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL allows to control the speculation misfeature, which
56is selected by arg2 of :manpage:`prctl(2)` per task. arg3 is used to hand
57in the control value, i.e. either PR_SPEC_ENABLE or PR_SPEC_DISABLE or
58PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE.
59
60Common error codes
61------------------
62======= =================================================================
63Value Meaning
64======= =================================================================
65EINVAL The prctl is not implemented by the architecture or unused
66 prctl(2) arguments are not 0.
67
68ENODEV arg2 is selecting a not supported speculation misfeature.
69======= =================================================================
70
71PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL error codes
72-----------------------------------
73======= =================================================================
74Value Meaning
75======= =================================================================
760 Success
77
78ERANGE arg3 is incorrect, i.e. it's neither PR_SPEC_ENABLE nor
79 PR_SPEC_DISABLE nor PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE.
80
81ENXIO Control of the selected speculation misfeature is not possible.
82 See PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL.
83
84EPERM Speculation was disabled with PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE and caller
85 tried to enable it again.
86======= =================================================================
87
88Speculation misfeature controls
89-------------------------------
90- PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS: Speculative Store Bypass
91
92 Invocations:
93 * prctl(PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, 0, 0, 0);
94 * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_ENABLE, 0, 0);
95 * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_DISABLE, 0, 0);
96 * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_STORE_BYPASS, PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE, 0, 0);
97
98- PR_SPEC_INDIR_BRANCH: Indirect Branch Speculation in User Processes
99 (Mitigate Spectre V2 style attacks against user processes)
100
101 Invocations:
102 * prctl(PR_GET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, 0, 0, 0);
103 * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, PR_SPEC_ENABLE, 0, 0);
104 * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, PR_SPEC_DISABLE, 0, 0);
105 * prctl(PR_SET_SPECULATION_CTRL, PR_SPEC_INDIRECT_BRANCH, PR_SPEC_FORCE_DISABLE, 0, 0);