security: allow using Clang's zero initialization for stack variables

In addition to -ftrivial-auto-var-init=pattern (used by
CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL now) Clang also supports zero initialization for
locals enabled by -ftrivial-auto-var-init=zero. The future of this flag
is still being debated (see https://bugs.llvm.org/show_bug.cgi?id=45497).
Right now it is guarded by another flag,
-enable-trivial-auto-var-init-zero-knowing-it-will-be-removed-from-clang,
which means it may not be supported by future Clang releases. Another
possible resolution is that -ftrivial-auto-var-init=zero will persist
(as certain users have already started depending on it), but the name
of the guard flag will change.

In the meantime, zero initialization has proven itself as a good
production mitigation measure against uninitialized locals. Unlike pattern
initialization, which has a higher chance of triggering existing bugs,
zero initialization provides safe defaults for strings, pointers, indexes,
and sizes. On the other hand, pattern initialization remains safer for
return values. Chrome OS and Android are moving to using zero
initialization for production builds.

Performance-wise, the difference between pattern and zero initialization
is usually negligible, although the generated code for zero
initialization is more compact.

This patch renames CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL to CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL_PATTERN
and introduces another config option, CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL_ZERO, that
enables zero initialization for locals if the corresponding flags are
supported by Clang.

Cc: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>
Cc: Nick Desaulniers <ndesaulniers@google.com>
Cc: Greg Kroah-Hartman <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>
Signed-off-by: Alexander Potapenko <glider@google.com>
Link: https://lore.kernel.org/r/20200616083435.223038-1-glider@google.com
Reviewed-by: Maciej Żenczykowski <maze@google.com>
Signed-off-by: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>

1 files changed, 11 insertions, 2 deletions

diff --git a/Makefile b/Makefile
index ae5d8220f431..d1cfbe5abc49 100644
--- a/Makefile
+++ b/Makefile
@@ -802,11 +802,20 @@ KBUILD_CFLAGS	+= -fomit-frame-pointer
 endif
 endif
 
-# Initialize all stack variables with a pattern, if desired.
-ifdef CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL
+# Initialize all stack variables with a 0xAA pattern.
+ifdef CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL_PATTERN
 KBUILD_CFLAGS	+= -ftrivial-auto-var-init=pattern
 endif
 
+# Initialize all stack variables with a zero value.
+ifdef CONFIG_INIT_STACK_ALL_ZERO
+# Future support for zero initialization is still being debated, see
+# https://bugs.llvm.org/show_bug.cgi?id=45497. These flags are subject to being
+# renamed or dropped.
+KBUILD_CFLAGS	+= -ftrivial-auto-var-init=zero
+KBUILD_CFLAGS	+= -enable-trivial-auto-var-init-zero-knowing-it-will-be-removed-from-clang
+endif
+
 DEBUG_CFLAGS	:= $(call cc-option, -fno-var-tracking-assignments)
 
 ifdef CONFIG_DEBUG_INFO