netfilter: add user-space connection tracking helper infrastructure

There are good reasons to supports helpers in user-space instead:

* Rapid connection tracking helper development, as developing code
  in user-space is usually faster.

* Reliability: A buggy helper does not crash the kernel. Moreover,
  we can monitor the helper process and restart it in case of problems.

* Security: Avoid complex string matching and mangling in kernel-space
  running in privileged mode. Going further, we can even think about
  running user-space helpers as a non-root process.

* Extensibility: It allows the development of very specific helpers (most
  likely non-standard proprietary protocols) that are very likely not to be
  accepted for mainline inclusion in the form of kernel-space connection
  tracking helpers.

This patch adds the infrastructure to allow the implementation of
user-space conntrack helpers by means of the new nfnetlink subsystem
`nfnetlink_cthelper' and the existing queueing infrastructure
(nfnetlink_queue).

I had to add the new hook NF_IP6_PRI_CONNTRACK_HELPER to register
ipv[4|6]_helper which results from splitting ipv[4|6]_confirm into
two pieces. This change is required not to break NAT sequence
adjustment and conntrack confirmation for traffic that is enqueued
to our user-space conntrack helpers.

Basic operation, in a few steps:

1) Register user-space helper by means of `nfct':

 nfct helper add ftp inet tcp

 [ It must be a valid existing helper supported by conntrack-tools ]

2) Add rules to enable the FTP user-space helper which is
   used to track traffic going to TCP port 21.

For locally generated packets:

 iptables -I OUTPUT -t raw -p tcp --dport 21 -j CT --helper ftp

For non-locally generated packets:

 iptables -I PREROUTING -t raw -p tcp --dport 21 -j CT --helper ftp

3) Run the test conntrackd in helper mode (see example files under
   doc/helper/conntrackd.conf

 conntrackd

4) Generate FTP traffic going, if everything is OK, then conntrackd
   should create expectations (you can check that with `conntrack':

 conntrack -E expect

    [NEW] 301 proto=6 src=192.168.1.136 dst=130.89.148.12 sport=0 dport=54037 mask-src=255.255.255.255 mask-dst=255.255.255.255 sport=0 dport=65535 master-src=192.168.1.136 master-dst=130.89.148.12 sport=57127 dport=21 class=0 helper=ftp
[DESTROY] 301 proto=6 src=192.168.1.136 dst=130.89.148.12 sport=0 dport=54037 mask-src=255.255.255.255 mask-dst=255.255.255.255 sport=0 dport=65535 master-src=192.168.1.136 master-dst=130.89.148.12 sport=57127 dport=21 class=0 helper=ftp

This confirms that our test helper is receiving packets including the
conntrack information, and adding expectations in kernel-space.

The user-space helper can also store its private tracking information
in the conntrack structure in the kernel via the CTA_HELP_INFO. The
kernel will consider this a binary blob whose layout is unknown. This
information will be included in the information that is transfered
to user-space via glue code that integrates nfnetlink_queue and
ctnetlink.

Signed-off-by: Pablo Neira Ayuso <pablo@netfilter.org>

1 files changed, 32 insertions, 11 deletions

diff --git a/net/ipv6/netfilter/nf_conntrack_l3proto_ipv6.c b/net/ipv6/netfilter/nf_conntrack_l3proto_ipv6.c
index fca10da80ea7..4794f96cf2e0 100644
--- a/net/ipv6/netfilter/nf_conntrack_l3proto_ipv6.c
+++ b/net/ipv6/netfilter/nf_conntrack_l3proto_ipv6.c
@@ -143,11 +143,11 @@ static int ipv6_get_l4proto(const struct sk_buff *skb, unsigned int nhoff,
         return NF_ACCEPT;
 }
 
-static unsigned int ipv6_confirm(unsigned int hooknum,
-                                 struct sk_buff *skb,
-                                 const struct net_device *in,
-                                 const struct net_device *out,
-                                 int (*okfn)(struct sk_buff *))
+static unsigned int ipv6_helper(unsigned int hooknum,
+                                struct sk_buff *skb,
+                                const struct net_device *in,
+                                const struct net_device *out,
+                                int (*okfn)(struct sk_buff *))
 {
         struct nf_conn *ct;
         const struct nf_conn_help *help;
@@ -161,15 +161,15 @@ static unsigned int ipv6_confirm(unsigned int hooknum,
         /* This is where we call the helper: as the packet goes out. */
         ct = nf_ct_get(skb, &ctinfo);
         if (!ct || ctinfo == IP_CT_RELATED_REPLY)
-                goto out;
+                return NF_ACCEPT;
 
         help = nfct_help(ct);
         if (!help)
-                goto out;
+                return NF_ACCEPT;
         /* rcu_read_lock()ed by nf_hook_slow */
         helper = rcu_dereference(help->helper);
         if (!helper)
-                goto out;
+                return NF_ACCEPT;
 
         protoff = nf_ct_ipv6_skip_exthdr(skb, extoff, &pnum,
                                          skb->len - extoff);
@@ -179,12 +179,19 @@ static unsigned int ipv6_confirm(unsigned int hooknum,
         }
 
         ret = helper->help(skb, protoff, ct, ctinfo);
-        if (ret != NF_ACCEPT) {
+        if (ret != NF_ACCEPT && (ret & NF_VERDICT_MASK) != NF_QUEUE) {
                 nf_log_packet(NFPROTO_IPV6, hooknum, skb, in, out, NULL,
                               "nf_ct_%s: dropping packet", helper->name);
-                return ret;
         }
-out:
+        return ret;
+}
+
+static unsigned int ipv6_confirm(unsigned int hooknum,
+                                 struct sk_buff *skb,
+                                 const struct net_device *in,
+                                 const struct net_device *out,
+                                 int (*okfn)(struct sk_buff *))
+{
         /* We've seen it coming out the other side: confirm it */
         return nf_conntrack_confirm(skb);
 }
@@ -254,6 +261,13 @@ static struct nf_hook_ops ipv6_conntrack_ops[] __read_mostly = {
                 .priority       = NF_IP6_PRI_CONNTRACK,
         },
         {
+                .hook           = ipv6_helper,
+                .owner          = THIS_MODULE,
+                .pf             = NFPROTO_IPV6,
+                .hooknum        = NF_INET_POST_ROUTING,
+                .priority       = NF_IP6_PRI_CONNTRACK_HELPER,
+        },
+        {
                 .hook           = ipv6_confirm,
                 .owner          = THIS_MODULE,
                 .pf             = NFPROTO_IPV6,
@@ -261,6 +275,13 @@ static struct nf_hook_ops ipv6_conntrack_ops[] __read_mostly = {
                 .priority       = NF_IP6_PRI_LAST,
         },
         {
+                .hook           = ipv6_helper,
+                .owner          = THIS_MODULE,
+                .pf             = NFPROTO_IPV6,
+                .hooknum        = NF_INET_LOCAL_IN,
+                .priority       = NF_IP6_PRI_CONNTRACK_HELPER,
+        },
+        {
                 .hook           = ipv6_confirm,
                 .owner          = THIS_MODULE,
                 .pf             = NFPROTO_IPV6,