@@ -180,8 +180,7 @@ void set_task_blockstep(struct task_struct *task, bool on)
*
* NOTE: this means that set/clear TIF_BLOCKSTEP is only safe if
* task is current or it can't be running, otherwise we can race
- * with __switch_to_xtra(). We rely on ptrace_freeze_traced() but
- * PTRACE_KILL is not safe.
+ * with __switch_to_xtra(). We rely on ptrace_freeze_traced().
*/
local_irq_disable();
debugctl = get_debugctlmsr();
@@ -1236,9 +1236,8 @@ int ptrace_request(struct task_struct *child, long request,
return ptrace_resume(child, request, data);
case PTRACE_KILL:
- if (child->exit_state) /* already dead */
- return 0;
- return ptrace_resume(child, request, SIGKILL);
+ send_sig_info(SIGKILL, SEND_SIG_NOINFO, child);
+ return 0;
#ifdef CONFIG_HAVE_ARCH_TRACEHOOK
case PTRACE_GETREGSET:
The current implementation of PTRACE_KILL is buggy and has been for many years as it assumes it's target has stopped in ptrace_stop. At a quick skim it looks like this assumption has existed since ptrace support was added in linux v1.0. While PTRACE_KILL has been deprecated we can not remove it as a quick search with google code search reveals many existing programs calling it. When the ptracee is not stopped at ptrace_stop some fields would be set that are ignored except in ptrace_stop. Making the userspace visible behavior of PTRACE_KILL a noop in those case. As the usual rules are not obeyed it is not clear what the consequences are of calling PTRACE_KILL on a running process. Presumably userspace does not do this as it achieves nothing. Replace the implementation of PTRACE_KILL with a simple send_sig_info(SIGKILL) followed by a return 0. This changes the observable user space behavior only in that PTRACE_KILL on a process not stopped in ptrace_stop will also kill it. As that has always been the intent of the code this seems like a reasonable change. Cc: stable@vger.kernel.org Reported-by: Al Viro <viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk> Suggested-by: Al Viro <viro@zeniv.linux.org.uk> Signed-off-by: "Eric W. Biederman" <ebiederm@xmission.com> --- arch/x86/kernel/step.c | 3 +-- kernel/ptrace.c | 5 ++--- 2 files changed, 3 insertions(+), 5 deletions(-)