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mtd: spi-nor: disallow further writes to SR if WP# is low
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Locking the flash is most useful if it provides real hardware security.
Otherwise, it's little more than a software permission bit.

A reasonable use case that provides real HW security might be like
follows:

(1) hardware WP# is deasserted
(2) program flash
(3) flash range is protected via status register
(4) hardware WP# is asserted
(5) flash protection range can no longer be changed, until WP# is
    deasserted

In this way, flash protection is co-owned by hardware and software.

Now, one would expect to be able to perform step (3) with
ioctl(MEMLOCK), except that the spi-nor driver does not set the Status
Register Protect bit (a.k.a. Status Register Write Disable (SRWD)), so
even though the range is now locked, it does not satisfy step (5) -- it
can still be changed by a call to ioctl(MEMUNLOCK).

So, let's enable status register protection after the first lock
command, and disable protection only when the flash is fully unlocked.

Signed-off-by: Brian Norris <computersforpeace@gmail.com>
Tested-by: Ezequiel Garcia <ezequiel@vanguardiasur.com.ar>
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Brian Norris committed Mar 8, 2016
1 parent f886080 commit 47b8edb
Showing 1 changed file with 7 additions and 0 deletions.
7 changes: 7 additions & 0 deletions drivers/mtd/spi-nor/spi-nor.c
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -540,6 +540,9 @@ static int stm_lock(struct spi_nor *nor, loff_t ofs, uint64_t len)

status_new = (status_old & ~mask) | val;

/* Disallow further writes if WP pin is asserted */
status_new |= SR_SRWD;

/* Don't bother if they're the same */
if (status_new == status_old)
return 0;
Expand Down Expand Up @@ -605,6 +608,10 @@ static int stm_unlock(struct spi_nor *nor, loff_t ofs, uint64_t len)

status_new = (status_old & ~mask) | val;

/* Don't protect status register if we're fully unlocked */
if (lock_len == mtd->size)
status_new &= ~SR_SRWD;

/* Don't bother if they're the same */
if (status_new == status_old)
return 0;
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