Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2)
Date:      Sun, 06 Aug 2017 18:53:42 +0000
From:      bugzilla-noreply@freebsd.org
To:        freebsd-bugs@FreeBSD.org
Subject:   [Bug 221289] Setting loader.conf password prevents autoboot, manual boot still okay; password leaked
Message-ID:  <bug-221289-8@https.bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/>

next in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=3D221289

            Bug ID: 221289
           Summary: Setting loader.conf password prevents autoboot, manual
                    boot still okay; password leaked
           Product: Base System
           Version: 11.1-STABLE
          Hardware: amd64
                OS: Any
            Status: New
          Severity: Affects Some People
          Priority: ---
         Component: kern
          Assignee: freebsd-bugs@FreeBSD.org
          Reporter: fred@boyce.za.net

Hi Team

As my first bug report, I'll take the opportunity to say thanks! to everyone
who contributes.

I have a fresh install of Free 11.1 in a Parallels VM on my Mac. I used ZFS
auto-layout on installation; ZFS seems unrelated to the problem described h=
ere.

Problem 1: Everything is fine until I add 'password=3D"test"' to the
/boot/loader.conf. Rebooting then fails:

    Loading /boot/defaults/loader.conf
    can't load 'kernel'
    no valid kernel found

...and then I'm dropped into the (Forth I think) shell/interpreter.

At this point, if I try to "autoboot", I get these errors again:

    can't load 'kernel'
    no valid kernel found

But if I simply "boot", everything proceeds correctly.

The "show" command reveals:

    kernel=3Dkernel
    kernel_options=3D

...and the mystic variable "kernelname" is not set at this point (added to
boot.c in Git revision
https://github.com/freebsd/freebsd/commit/475f83c70ca2a39eacdb9dfe774681a8e=
8c2f305#diff-337b216f8bcf5c9351318742f496b65e).

This seems to be a problem beyond just my experience:
https://forums.freebsd.org/threads/58292/. It seems to be unrelated to the
previous problem described in
https://bugs.freebsd.org/bugzilla/show_bug.cgi?id=3D170110.

I don't know if it makes a difference that line 80 of sys/boot/common/boot.c
calls loadakernel(0, argc - 1, argv + 1); in the boot case, but only
loadakernel(0, 0, argv); in the autoboot case? (Sorry, I don't have the
understanding to try to debug further).

----

Problem 2: Once we've failed to boot, and dropped to the interpreter, a sim=
ple
"show" will reveal the boot password in plain text as one of the environment
variables. I suppose it would be a kludgy workaround to filter out the pass=
word
variables from "command_show" in sys/boot/common/commands.c; but that would
have other unintended consequences for debugging? Is it not possible to
integrate a lightweight hashing function to rather hash the password in
loader.conf for comparison in the boot loader?

Thanks!

--=20
You are receiving this mail because:
You are the assignee for the bug.=



Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?bug-221289-8>