CVE-2020-16120

Description

Overlayfs did not properly perform permission checking when copying up files in an overlayfs and could be exploited from within a user namespace, if, for example, unprivileged user namespaces were allowed. It was possible to have a file not readable by an unprivileged user to be copied to a mountpoint controlled by the user, like a removable device. This was introduced in kernel version 4.19 by commit d1d04ef (ovl: stack file ops). This was fixed in kernel version 5.8 by commits 56230d9 (ovl: verify permissions in ovl_path_open()), 48bd024 (ovl: switch to mounter creds in readdir) and 05acefb (ovl: check permission to open real file). Additionally, commits 130fdbc (ovl: pass correct flags for opening real directory) and 292f902 (ovl: call secutiry hook in ovl_real_ioctl()) in kernel 5.8 might also be desired or necessary. These additional commits introduced a regression in overlay mounts within user namespaces which prevented access to files with ownership outside of the user namespace. This regression was mitigated by subsequent commit b6650da (ovl: do not fail because of O_NOATIMEi) in kernel 5.11.

Risk Information

Associated Vulnerability

Patch Details

References

https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-1234
https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2023-1234