[llvm-dev] Possible soundness issue with available_externally (split from "RFC: Add guard intrinsics")

[Hal Finkel via llvm-dev]

----- Original Message -----

> From: "James Y Knight via llvm-dev" <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org>
> To: "Sanjoy Das" <sanjoy at playingwithpointers.com>
> Cc: "llvm-dev" <llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org>
> Sent: Thursday, February 25, 2016 1:41:43 PM
> Subject: Re: [llvm-dev] Possible soundness issue with
> available_externally (split from "RFC: Add guard intrinsics")

> While we're talking about this, I'd just mention again that the same
> issue arises for *normal* functions too, when linked into a shared
> library:
> int foo() { return 1; }

> int bar() { return foo(); }

> Now, compare:
> clang -fPIC -O1 -S -o - test.c

> gcc -fPIC -O1 -S -o - test.c

> GCC will refuse to inline foo into bar, or use any information about
> foo in compiling bar, because foo is exported in the dynamic symbol
> table, and thus replaceable via symbol interposition.

> Clang assumes that you won't do that, or that you don't care what
> happens if you do. It will happily inline. And, in absense of
> inlining (e.g. if foo is too long to inline), clang will deduce
> function attributes about foo and rely on those in bar -- despite
> that the call goes through the PLT and could in fact be an entirely
> different unrelated implementation (or, for that matter, a
> differently-optimized version of the same implementation).

> Is that *really* okay?

I'm comfortable with saying that symbol interposition falls outside of the model we have for the targeted system (at least by default), and thus, this is okay. We also don't model the possibility of someone hex-editing the binary ;) 

-Hal 

> On Wed, Feb 24, 2016 at 6:57 PM, Sanjoy Das via llvm-dev <
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org > wrote:

> > Hi all,
> 

> > This is something that came up in the "RFC: Add guard intrinsics to
> 
> > LLVM" thread; and while I'm not exactly blocked on this, figuring
> > out
> 
> > a path forward here will be helpful in deciding if we can use the
> 
> > available_externally linkage type to expression certain semantic
> 
> > properties guard intrinsics will have.
> 

> > Let's start with an example that shows that we have a problem
> > (direct
> 
> > copy/paste from the guard intrinsics thread). Say we have:
> 

> > ```
> 
> > void foo() available_externally {
> 
> > %t0 = load atomic %ptr
> 
> > %t1 = load atomic %ptr
> 
> > if (%t0 != %t1) print("X");
> 
> > }
> 
> > void main() {
> 
> > foo();
> 
> > print("Y");
> 
> > }
> 
> > ```
> 

> > The possible behaviors of the above program are {print("X"),
> 
> > print("Y")} or {print("Y")}. But if we run opt then we have
> 

> > ```
> 
> > void foo() available_externally readnone nounwind {
> 
> > ;; After CSE'ing the two loads and folding the condition
> 
> > }
> 
> > void main() {
> 
> > foo();
> 
> > print("Y");
> 
> > }
> 
> > ```
> 

> > and some generic reordering
> 

> > ```
> 
> > void foo() available_externally readnone nounwind {
> 
> > ;; After CSE'ing the two loads and folding the condition
> 
> > }
> 
> > void main() {
> 
> > print("Y");
> 
> > foo(); // legal since we're moving a readnone nounwind function
> > that
> 
> > // was guaranteed to execute (hence can't have UB)
> 
> > }
> 
> > ```
> 

> > If we do not inline @foo(), and instead re-link the call site in
> > @main
> 
> > to some non-optimized copy (or differently optimized copy) of @foo,
> 
> > then it is possible for the program to have the behavior
> > {print("Y");
> 
> > print ("X")}, which was disallowed in the earlier program.
> 

> > In other words, opt refined the semantics of @foo() (i.e. reduced
> > the
> 
> > set of behaviors it may have) in ways that would make later
> 
> > optimizations invalid if we de-refine the implementation of @foo().
> 

> > The above example is clearly fabricated, but such cases can come up
> 
> > even if everything is optimized to the same level. E.g. one of the
> 
> > atomic loads in the unrefined implementation of @foo() could have
> > been
> 
> > hidden behind a function call, whose body existed in only one
> > module.
> 
> > That module would then be able to refine @foo() to `ret void` but
> 
> > other modules won't.
> 

> > The only solution I can think of is to redefine
> > available_externally
> 
> > to mean "the only kind of IPO/IPA you can do over a call to this
> 
> > function is to inline it". Redefining available_externally this way
> 
> > will also let us soundly use it to represent calls to functions
> > that
> 
> > have guard intrinsics, since a failed guard intrinsic basically
> 
> > replaces the function with a "very de-refined" implementation (the
> 
> > interpreter).
> 

> > What do you think? I don't think implementing the above above will
> > be
> 
> > very difficult, but needless to say, it will still be a fairly
> 
> > non-trivial semantic change (hence I'm not directly jumping to
> 
> > implementation).
> 

> > -- Sanjoy
> 
> > _______________________________________________
> 
> > LLVM Developers mailing list
> 
> > llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
> 
> > http://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev
> 

> _______________________________________________
> LLVM Developers mailing list
> llvm-dev at lists.llvm.org
> http://lists.llvm.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/llvm-dev

-- 

Hal Finkel 
Assistant Computational Scientist 
Leadership Computing Facility 
Argonne National Laboratory 
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.llvm.org/pipermail/llvm-dev/attachments/20160226/796e1c12/attachment.html>