Re: [PATCH v5] nvme: reject passthrough of driver-managed Set Features
From: Tokunori Ikegami
Date: Mon May 25 2026 - 11:39:45 EST
On 2026/05/24 7:56, Chao Shi wrote:
Since commit b58da2d270db ("nvme: update keep alive interval when kato
is modified"), userspace can start keep-alive on any transport via a
Set Features (KATO) passthrough command. nvme_keep_alive_work() then
allocates with BLK_MQ_REQ_RESERVED, but nvme_alloc_admin_tag_set()
only reserves admin tags for fabrics, so the allocation trips
WARN_ON_ONCE() in blk_mq_get_tag() and fails:
nvme nvme0: keep-alive failed: -11
More generally, several Set Features change controller state that the
driver manages itself and cannot react to correctly when set behind
its back from userspace. Reject these in nvme_cmd_allowed():
- KATO on non-fabrics (keep-alive is only armed for fabrics; on PCIe
it has no reserved tag and an active keep-alive harms idle power
states)
- Host Behavior Support, Host Memory Buffer, Number of Queues, and
Autonomous Power State Transition (all driver-managed)
Keep Alive on fabrics is unchanged. I/O commands are unaffected as the
check is confined to the admin path (ns == NULL).
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/linux-nvme/20260522162639.395802-1-coshi036@xxxxxxxxx/
Fixes: b58da2d270db ("nvme: update keep alive interval when kato is modified")
Found by FuzzNvme(Syzkaller with FEMU fuzzing framework).
Acked-by: Sungwoo Kim <iam@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Acked-by: Dave Tian <daveti@xxxxxxxxxx>
Acked-by: Weidong Zhu <weizhu@xxxxxxx>
Signed-off-by: Chao Shi <coshi036@xxxxxxxxx>
---
Reproducer for the keep-alive case (run as root on a PCIe NVMe device):
#include <fcntl.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <sys/ioctl.h>
#include <linux/nvme_ioctl.h>
int main(void)
{
struct nvme_admin_cmd cmd = {0};
int fd = open("/dev/nvme0", O_RDWR);
if (fd < 0) { perror("open"); return 1; }
cmd.opcode = 0x09; /* SET_FEATURES */
cmd.cdw10 = 0x0f; /* Feature ID: KATO */
cmd.cdw11 = 5; /* KATO = 5 seconds */
if (ioctl(fd, NVME_IOCTL_ADMIN_CMD, &cmd) < 0) {
perror("ioctl");
return 1;
}
return 0;
}
On an unpatched kernel, within ~kato/2 seconds after the program exits,
dmesg shows:
nvme nvme0: keep alive interval updated from 0 ms to 5000 ms
WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: ... at block/blk-mq-tag.c:148 blk_mq_get_tag+...
nvme nvme0: keep-alive failed: -11
With this patch the ioctl fails with EACCES on non-fabrics.
Changes since v4:
- Fold the check into the existing nvme_cmd_allowed() instead of a
separate helper, and reject additional driver-managed Set Features
(Host Behavior, Host Memory Buffer, Number of Queues, Autonomous
Power State Transition) in the same switch (Keith Busch). The admin
vs I/O distinction is now structural: the switch lives in the
ns == NULL branch, so I/O commands (e.g. Dataset Management, which
shares opcode 0x09 with Set Features) are never inspected.
Changes since v3:
- Only inspect admin commands so a DSM I/O command is not wrongly
rejected (Keith Busch).
Changes since v2:
- Reject the KATO passthrough on non-fabrics instead of reserving an
admin tag for all transports (Keith Busch, Christoph Hellwig).
Changes since v1:
- v2 added a spec citation and quirk discussion, superseded by the
reject approach.
drivers/nvme/host/ioctl.c | 33 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++------
1 file changed, 27 insertions(+), 6 deletions(-)
diff --git a/drivers/nvme/host/ioctl.c b/drivers/nvme/host/ioctl.c
index a9c097dacad6..31784506e845 100644
--- a/drivers/nvme/host/ioctl.c
+++ b/drivers/nvme/host/ioctl.c
@@ -14,8 +14,9 @@ enum {
NVME_IOCTL_PARTITION = (1 << 1),
};
-static bool nvme_cmd_allowed(struct nvme_ns *ns, struct nvme_command *c,
- unsigned int flags, bool open_for_write)
+static bool nvme_cmd_allowed(struct nvme_ctrl *ctrl, struct nvme_ns *ns,
+ struct nvme_command *c, unsigned int flags,
+ bool open_for_write)
The struct nvme_ns does already have the struct nvme_ctrl *ctrl as a member variable as below so seems not necessary to add the function argument struct nvme_ctrl *ctrl.
struct nvme_ns {
struct list_head list;
struct nvme_ctrl *ctrl;