[PATCH] exec: fix off-by-one in binfmt max rewrite depth comment

From: Alan Urmancheev

Date: Tue Jun 23 2026 - 14:50:01 EST


The loop in exec_binprm() permits depth values 0 through 5, up to 5
successive binfmt rewrites (setting bprm->interpreter) until the 6th
one would fail on depth > 5 and return -ELOOP. The comment claimed 4
levels, which was wrong. Adjusting the code to allow only 4 rewrites
would be breaking userland, so fix the comment and not the code.

Reproducer (a chain of shebanged scripts followed by an ELF binary):

#!/bin/sh

tmp=$(mktemp -d)
echo $tmp
cd $tmp

mk () { echo $2 > $1; chmod +x $1; }

for i in $(seq 4); do
mk $i "#!$((i + 1))"
done

mk 5 '#!/bin/true'
./1 &&
echo '5 binfmt rewrites OK (1 -> 2 -> 3 -> 4 -> 5 -> /bin/true)'

mk 5 '#!6'
mk 6 '#!/bin/true'
./1 ||
echo '6 binfmt rewrites KO (1 -> 2 -> 3 -> 4 -> 5 -> 6 -> /bin/true)'

Signed-off-by: Alan Urmancheev <alan.urman@xxxxxxxxx>
---
fs/exec.c | 2 +-
1 file changed, 1 insertion(+), 1 deletion(-)

diff --git a/fs/exec.c b/fs/exec.c
index b92fe7db1..d5993cedc 100644
--- a/fs/exec.c
+++ b/fs/exec.c
@@ -1717,7 +1717,7 @@ static int exec_binprm(struct linux_binprm *bprm)
old_vpid = task_pid_nr_ns(current, task_active_pid_ns(current->parent));
rcu_read_unlock();

- /* This allows 4 levels of binfmt rewrites before failing hard. */
+ /* This allows 5 levels of binfmt rewrites before failing hard. */
for (depth = 0;; depth++) {
struct file *exec;
if (depth > 5)
--
2.53.0