tracing: Warn when an event dereferences a pointer in TP_printk()

Currently on boot up and when modules are loaded, the trace event
infrastructure will examine the TP_printk's of every event looking to see
if it dereferences pointers on the ring buffer via printk formats like
"%pB" and such. What it doesn't do is check if the arguments themselves
do a dereference from a pointer.

This was brought with a fix[1] to the fsl_edma event that had in the
arguments of the TP_printk(): "__entry->edma->membase"

The __entry->edma is a pointer saved in the ring buffer. The dereference
from TP_printk() happens when the user reads the "trace" file which can be
seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, or even months later! There is no
guarantee that the __entry->edma pointer will still be pointing to what it
was when it was recorded, and could crash the kernel when a user reads the
event.

Add logic to the test_event_printk() that also checks for this case and
warn if the event dereferences a pointer from the ring buffer.

[1] https://lore.kernel.org/all/20260630200022.1826420-1-martin@kaiser.cx/

Link: https://patch.msgid.link/20260630184836.74d477b6@gandalf.local.home
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>
Reviewed-by: Martin Kaiser <martin@kaiser.cx>
Reviewed-by: Vinod Koul <vkoul@kernel.org>
Signed-off-by: Steven Rostedt <rostedt@goodmis.org>

1 files changed, 29 insertions, 6 deletions

diff --git a/kernel/trace/trace_events.c b/kernel/trace/trace_events.c
index e0449e648871..714285e23a2e 100644
--- a/kernel/trace/trace_events.c
+++ b/kernel/trace/trace_events.c
@@ -401,6 +401,31 @@ static bool process_string(const char *fmt, int len, struct trace_event_call *ca
 	return true;
 }
 
+static void test_double_dereference(const char *str, int len,
+				    struct trace_event_call *call)
+{
+	const char *ptr;
+	const char *end = str + len;
+
+	ptr = strstr(str, "REC->");
+
+	while (ptr && ptr < end) {
+
+		ptr += 5;
+		for (; ptr < end; ptr++) {
+			if (ptr[0] == '-' && ptr[1] == '>') {
+				WARN_ONCE(1, "Event %s has double dereference in TP_printk: %.*s\n",
+					  trace_event_name(call), len, str);
+				return;
+			}
+			if (!isalnum(*ptr) && *ptr != '_')
+				break;
+		}
+
+		ptr = strstr(ptr, "REC->");
+	}
+}
+
 static void handle_dereference_arg(const char *arg_str, u64 string_flags, int len,
 				   u64 *dereference_flags, int arg,
 				   struct trace_event_call *call)
@@ -460,12 +485,6 @@ static void test_event_printk(struct trace_event_call *call)
 				if (in_quote) {
 					arg = 0;
 					first = false;
-					/*
-					 * If there was no %p* uses
-					 * the fmt is OK.
-					 */
-					if (!dereference_flags)
-						return;
 				}
 			}
 			if (in_quote) {
@@ -577,6 +596,8 @@ static void test_event_printk(struct trace_event_call *call)
 				continue;
 			}
 
+			test_double_dereference(fmt + start_arg, e - start_arg, call);
+
 			if (dereference_flags & (1ULL << arg)) {
 				handle_dereference_arg(fmt + start_arg, string_flags,
 						       e - start_arg,
@@ -590,6 +611,8 @@ static void test_event_printk(struct trace_event_call *call)
 		}
 	}
 
+	test_double_dereference(fmt + start_arg, i - start_arg, call);
+
 	if (dereference_flags & (1ULL << arg)) {
 		handle_dereference_arg(fmt + start_arg, string_flags,
 				       i - start_arg,