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linux/include
Daniel Borkmann 3744b0964d ipv6: Implement limits on extension header parsing
ipv6_{skip_exthdr,find_hdr}() and ip6_{tnl_parse_tlv_enc_lim,
protocol_deliver_rcu}() iterate over IPv6 extension headers until they
find a non-extension-header protocol or run out of packet data. The
loops have no iteration counter, relying solely on the packet length
to bound them. For a crafted packet with 8-byte extension headers
filling a 64KB jumbogram, this means a worst case of up to ~8k
iterations with a skb_header_pointer call each. ipv6_skip_exthdr(),
for example, is used where it parses the inner quoted packet inside
an incoming ICMPv6 error:

  - icmpv6_rcv
    - checksum validation
    - case ICMPV6_DEST_UNREACH
      - icmpv6_notify
        - pskb_may_pull()       <- pull inner IPv6 header
        - ipv6_skip_exthdr()    <- iterates here
        - pskb_may_pull()
        - ipprot->err_handler() <- sk lookup

The per-iteration cost of ipv6_skip_exthdr itself is generally
light, but skb_header_pointer becomes more costly on reassembled
packets: the first ~1232 bytes of the inner packet are in the skb's
linear area, but the remaining ~63KB are in the frag_list where
skb_copy_bits is needed to read data.

Initially, the idea was to add a configurable limit via a new
sysctl knob with default 8, in line with knobs from commit
47d3d7ac65 ("ipv6: Implement limits on Hop-by-Hop and Destination
options"), but two reasons eventually argued against it:

- It adds to UAPI that needs to be maintained forever, and
  upcoming work is restricting extension header ordering anyway,
  leaving little reason for another sysctl knob
- exthdrs_core.c is always built-in even when CONFIG_IPV6=n,
  where struct net has no .ipv6 member, so the read site would
  need an ifdef'd fallback to a constant anyway

Therefore, just use a constant (IP6_MAX_EXT_HDRS_CNT). All four
extension header walking functions are now bound by this limit.

Note that the check in ip6_protocol_deliver_rcu() happens right
before the goto resubmit, such that we don't have to have a test
for ipv6_ext_hdr() in the fast-path.

There's an ongoing IETF draft-iurman-6man-eh-occurrences to enforce
IPv6 extension headers ordering and occurrence. The latter also
discusses security implications. As per RFC8200 section 4.1, the
occurrence rules for extension headers provide a practical upper
bound which is 8. In order to be conservative, let's define
IP6_MAX_EXT_HDRS_CNT as 12 to leave enough room for quirky setups.
In the unlikely event that this is still not enough, then we might
need to reconsider a sysctl.

Signed-off-by: Daniel Borkmann <daniel@iogearbox.net>
Reviewed-by: Ido Schimmel <idosch@nvidia.com>
Reviewed-by: Eric Dumazet <edumazet@google.com>
Reviewed-by: Justin Iurman <justin.iurman@gmail.com>
Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260429154648.809751-1-daniel@iogearbox.net
Signed-off-by: Jakub Kicinski <kuba@kernel.org>
2026-04-30 17:21:45 -07:00
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