[for-linus][PATCH 4/5] tracing/filters: Fix false positive match in regex_match_full()
From: Steven Rostedt
Date: Wed Jul 29 2026 - 19:58:10 EST
From: "Masami Hiramatsu (Google)" <mhiramat@xxxxxxxxxx>
regex_match_full() calls strncmp(str, r->pattern, len) where len is the
target field buffer size. When len is smaller than r->len (the filter
pattern length), strncmp() checks only len bytes of r->pattern against
str. If those len bytes match, strncmp() returns 0, resulting in a
false-positive match where a shorter string in a fixed-size field
matches a longer filter pattern.
For example, a 4-byte static string field containing "abcd" matched the
filter pattern "abcdefgh" because strncmp("abcd", "abcdefgh", 4)
returned 0. In this case, @len does NOT include '\0' because it is
fixed-size array.
Fix this by returning 0 (no match) early when len < r->len.
Fixes: 1889d20922d1 ("tracing/filters: Provide basic regex support")
Cc: stable@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/178528488779.124250.5571741156199253769.stgit@devnote2
Assisted-by: Antigravity:gemini-3.5-flash
Signed-off-by: Masami Hiramatsu (Google) <mhiramat@xxxxxxxxxx>
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@xxxxxxxxxxx>
---
kernel/trace/trace_events_filter.c | 3 +++
1 file changed, 3 insertions(+)
diff --git a/kernel/trace/trace_events_filter.c b/kernel/trace/trace_events_filter.c
index 6385cd662d8d..2b46ca536045 100644
--- a/kernel/trace/trace_events_filter.c
+++ b/kernel/trace/trace_events_filter.c
@@ -1027,6 +1027,9 @@ static int regex_match_full(char *str, struct regex *r, int len)
if (!len)
return strcmp(str, r->pattern) == 0;
+ if (len < r->len)
+ return 0;
+
return strncmp(str, r->pattern, len) == 0;
}
--
2.53.0