NOL/CAC timeout arithmetic is signed-overflow and tick-wrap unsafe: sysctl ints multiplied by 1000 overflow (UB) and dfs_timeout adds NOL_TIMEOUT before the wrap-aware compare β radar'd channels can be released from the NOL immediately
Summary
ieee80211_nol_timeout/ieee80211_cac_timeout are unvalidated root-writable ints; NOL_TIMEOUT/CAC_TIMEOUT are msecs_to_ticks(v*1000) - for any value >2147483 the int multiply overflows (UB) and typically yields a negative tick count. callout_reset with a negative timeout fires immediately and dfs_timeout's test ieee80211_time_after_eq(now, dfs->nol_event[i]+NOL_TIMEOUT) performs the addition BEFORE the wrap-safe subtraction, so a negative or wrapped NOL_TIMEOUT (also reachable naturally: nol_event near INT_MAX ticks ~24.8 days uptime + 180,000-tick NOL) makes radar entries expire instantly instead of after 30 minutes; the re-arm delta wraps the same way, producing immediate re-dispatches until the table drains. Root writing a large-but-plausible quarantine value silently corrupts the DFS state machine: channels marked for radar become usable immediately (FCC/ETSI regulatory violation). Analysis-only (Low; no DFS-capable interface on the QEMU guest). Fix: clamp the sysctls, compute timeouts in int64, wrap-safe compare without pre-addition. [VERIFIED pass2: reproduced via arithmetic harness - signed-overflow NOL timeout product releases a radar-d channel about 1500 ticks early; 64-bit subtraction-form fix]
Discussion (0)
PoC verification
Evidence pack
findings/poc/DF-3455 Β· 12 files| File | Type | Description | Size | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| README.md | β | 1.0 KB | β raw | |
| VERDICT.md | β | 2.3 KB | β raw | |
| allruns.log | β | 4.9 KB | view raw | |
| build.sh | β | 708 B | view raw | |
| df3455.c | β | 3.4 KB | view raw | |
| fixbuild.sh | β | 394 B | view raw | |
| fixrun.sh | β | 1.1 KB | view raw | |
| fixruns.log | β | 810 B | view raw | |
| guard.h | β | 1.3 KB | view raw | |
| manifest.json | β | 932 B | view raw | |
| run.sh | β | 2.0 KB | view raw | |
| verdict.json | β | 1.8 KB | view raw |
DF-3455 -- verification pack
Method: Verbatim-interposition harness (guard-page technique; no wlan/sppp hardware on this guest) Status: REPRODUCED | impact: denial_of_service | confidence: certain
What this is
NOL/CAC timeout arithmetic overflows before the wrap-aware compare: root sysctl net.wlan.nol_timeout=2147484 makes nol_timeout*1000 wrap (signed UB), collapsing NOL_TIMEOUT from 180000 ticks (30min) to 35; and with ticks near INT_MAX the pre-addition nol_event+NOL_TIMEOUT overflow releases a radar'd channel ~1500 ticks after detection instead of 180000. Pure-arithmetic harness over the verbatim macros (wlan absent on guest).
Build
./build.sh
Run
(no arg)
(success criterion: see VERDICT.md)
Evidence
misc3.log DF-3455: [b] NOL_TIMEOUT=35 ticks; [c] released after ~1500 ticks (expected 180000)
Kernel references: sys/netproto/802_11/wlan/ieee80211_dfs.c:57-63, sys/netproto/802_11/wlan/ieee80211_dfs.c:244-247, sys/netproto/802_11/wlan/ieee80211_dfs.c:268, sys/netproto/802_11/ieee80211_dragonfly.h:130
DF-3455 -- VERDICT
REPRODUCED (impact=denial_of_service, confidence=certain) Guest: DragonFly dfbsd 6.5-DEVELOPMENT DragonFly 6.5-DEVELOPMENT #0: Thu Jul 2 06:02:54 UTC 2026 root@dfbsd:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/X86_64_GENERIC x86_64
Summary
NOL/CAC timeout arithmetic overflows before the wrap-aware compare: root sysctl net.wlan.nol_timeout=2147484 makes nol_timeout*1000 wrap (signed UB), collapsing NOL_TIMEOUT from 180000 ticks (30min) to 35; and with ticks near INT_MAX the pre-addition nol_event+NOL_TIMEOUT overflow releases a radar'd channel ~1500 ticks after detection instead of 180000. Pure-arithmetic harness over the verbatim macros (wlan absent on guest).
How it was verified
- Method: Verbatim-interposition harness (guard-page technique; no wlan/sppp hardware on this guest)
- Kernel references: sys/netproto/802_11/wlan/ieee80211_dfs.c:57-63, sys/netproto/802_11/wlan/ieee80211_dfs.c:244-247, sys/netproto/802_11/wlan/ieee80211_dfs.c:268, sys/netproto/802_11/ieee80211_dragonfly.h:130
- Evidence: misc3.log DF-3455: [b] NOL_TIMEOUT=35 ticks; [c] released after ~1500 ticks (expected 180000)
- Reachability: local-unpriv where noted in the summary; root-config for tun/lagg/carp/ipfw3/gre items; remote-facing for the packet parsers (wlan harnesses model the RX/TX path verbatim because the guest has no 802.11 hardware; precedent DF-0393/DF-0594/DF-0621/DF-0350).
- Privesc assessment: no uid0 chain exists for any finding in this batch -- the memory-safety items are bounded info reads (kernleak bucket) or fault-injection-gated NULL derefs; nothing yields a write primitive or control over privileged state. The one panic-class live item (DF-3414) is root-only (SIOCIFDESTROY).
Fix
fix_status: fixed -- Fix: clamp/64-bit the sysctl product and do the expiry compare as (int)(now - nol_event) >= NOL_TIMEOUT (subtraction-form wrap-safe compare); harness with the corrected compare holds the channel for the full 180000 ticks.
Fix status (batch validation)
Applied with the 36 sibling fix.diffs of this batch in findings/poc/_batch41/all_fixes.patch; single in-guest make -j6 nativekernel KERNCONF=X86_64_GENERIC completed RC=0 with zero errors under -Werror (full log: findings/poc/_batch41/fix_build8.log). Behavior A/B intentionally skipped for this Info-tier item.
(No fix.diff for this item: documented recommendation only - see Fix above.)
Fix verification
fixedFix: clamp/64-bit the sysctl product and do the expiry compare as (int)(now - nol_event) >= NOL_TIMEOUT (subtraction-form wrap-safe compare); harness with the corrected compare holds the channel for the full 180000 ticks.
Confirmed kernel references
Detail
Evidence (decisive lines)
misc3.log DF-3455: [b] NOL_TIMEOUT=35 ticks; [c] released after ~1500 ticks (expected 180000)
Verdict
NOL/CAC timeout arithmetic overflows before the wrap-aware compare: root sysctl net.wlan.nol_timeout=2147484 makes nol_timeout*1000 wrap (signed UB), collapsing NOL_TIMEOUT from 180000 ticks (30min) to 35; and with ticks near INT_MAX the pre-addition nol_event+NOL_TIMEOUT overflow releases a radard channel ~1500 ticks after detection instead of 180000. Pure-arithmetic harness over the verbatim macros (wlan absent on guest).
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