[PATCH net] ipv4: fix use-after-free in fib_nhc_update_mtu()

From: Chengfeng Ye

Date: Fri Jul 31 2026 - 12:59:09 EST


fib_nhc_update_mtu() walks the nexthop exception table under RTNL, but
RTNL does not serialize this walk with PMTU exception updates. The walk
uses rcu_dereference_protected() with a constant true condition without
holding either fnhe_lock or an RCU read-side critical section.

The following interleaving can therefore occur:

CPU 0 CPU 1
fib_nhc_update_mtu() update_or_create_fnhe()
load fnhe spin_lock_bh(&fnhe_lock)
fnhe_remove_oldest()
unlink fnhe
kfree_rcu(fnhe, rcu)
<quiescent state>
access fnhe after grace period

KASAN reported:

BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in fib_nhc_update_mtu+0x3df/0x410
Read of size 8 at addr ffff888107d49000 by task poc/90
Call Trace:
fib_nhc_update_mtu+0x3df/0x410
fib_sync_mtu+0x7a/0xd0
fib_netdev_event+0x229/0x3f0
netif_set_mtu_ext+0x33a/0x570
dev_set_mtu+0x88/0x120
Allocated by task 89:
update_or_create_fnhe+0xa80/0x1110
__ip_rt_update_pmtu+0x8f2/0xcd0
ipv4_sk_update_pmtu+0x49e/0x690
udp_err+0xd92/0x1080
Freed by task 0:
__kasan_slab_free+0x43/0x70
kvfree_rcu_cb+0x12f/0x420
rcu_core+0x509/0x18e0

Protect the full walk with rcu_read_lock() and use rcu_dereference()
for the RCU-published pointers. This prevents reclaim from completing
until all references held by the walk have been dropped, without
serializing PMTU updates against the entire hash-table traversal.

Fixes: af7d6cce5369 ("net: ipv4: update fnhe_pmtu when first hop's MTU changes")
Cc: stable@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Signed-off-by: Chengfeng Ye <nicoyip.dev@xxxxxxxxx>
---
net/ipv4/fib_semantics.c | 11 +++++++----
1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/net/ipv4/fib_semantics.c b/net/ipv4/fib_semantics.c
index 4f3c0740dde9..6ecc6654427c 100644
--- a/net/ipv4/fib_semantics.c
+++ b/net/ipv4/fib_semantics.c
@@ -1879,16 +1879,17 @@ void fib_nhc_update_mtu(struct fib_nh_common *nhc, u32 new, u32 orig)
struct fnhe_hash_bucket *bucket;
int i;

- bucket = rcu_dereference_protected(nhc->nhc_exceptions, 1);
+ rcu_read_lock();
+ bucket = rcu_dereference(nhc->nhc_exceptions);
if (!bucket)
- return;
+ goto out;

for (i = 0; i < FNHE_HASH_SIZE; i++) {
struct fib_nh_exception *fnhe;

- for (fnhe = rcu_dereference_protected(bucket[i].chain, 1);
+ for (fnhe = rcu_dereference(bucket[i].chain);
fnhe;
- fnhe = rcu_dereference_protected(fnhe->fnhe_next, 1)) {
+ fnhe = rcu_dereference(fnhe->fnhe_next)) {
if (fnhe->fnhe_mtu_locked) {
if (new <= fnhe->fnhe_pmtu) {
fnhe->fnhe_pmtu = new;
@@ -1900,6 +1901,8 @@ void fib_nhc_update_mtu(struct fib_nh_common *nhc, u32 new, u32 orig)
}
}
}
+out:
+ rcu_read_unlock();
}

void fib_sync_mtu(struct net_device *dev, u32 orig_mtu)
--
2.43.0