Introduce SEPARATE_CODE_AND_RODATA build flag

At the moment, all BL images share a similar memory layout: they start
with their code section, followed by their read-only data section.
The two sections are contiguous in memory. Therefore, the end of the
code section and the beginning of the read-only data one might share
a memory page. This forces both to be mapped with the same memory
attributes. As the code needs to be executable, this means that the
read-only data stored on the same memory page as the code are
executable as well. This could potentially be exploited as part of
a security attack.

This patch introduces a new build flag called
SEPARATE_CODE_AND_RODATA, which isolates the code and read-only data
on separate memory pages. This in turn allows independent control of
the access permissions for the code and read-only data.

This has an impact on memory footprint, as padding bytes need to be
introduced between the code and read-only data to ensure the
segragation of the two. To limit the memory cost, the memory layout
of the read-only section has been changed in this case.

 - When SEPARATE_CODE_AND_RODATA=0, the layout is unchanged, i.e.
   the read-only section still looks like this (padding omitted):

   |        ...        |
   +-------------------+
   | Exception vectors |
   +-------------------+
   |  Read-only data   |
   +-------------------+
   |       Code        |
   +-------------------+ BLx_BASE

   In this case, the linker script provides the limits of the whole
   read-only section.

 - When SEPARATE_CODE_AND_RODATA=1, the exception vectors and
   read-only data are swapped, such that the code and exception
   vectors are contiguous, followed by the read-only data. This
   gives the following new layout (padding omitted):

   |        ...        |
   +-------------------+
   |  Read-only data   |
   +-------------------+
   | Exception vectors |
   +-------------------+
   |       Code        |
   +-------------------+ BLx_BASE

   In this case, the linker script now exports 2 sets of addresses
   instead: the limits of the code and the limits of the read-only
   data. Refer to the Firmware Design guide for more details. This
   provides platform code with a finer-grained view of the image
   layout and allows it to map these 2 regions with the appropriate
   access permissions.

Note that SEPARATE_CODE_AND_RODATA applies to all BL images.

Change-Id: I936cf80164f6b66b6ad52b8edacadc532c935a49

1 files changed, 8 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/include/common/bl_common.h b/include/common/bl_common.h
index c43ad5ef..646a8172 100644
--- a/include/common/bl_common.h
+++ b/include/common/bl_common.h
@@ -143,8 +143,16 @@
  * Declarations of linker defined symbols to help determine memory layout of
  * BL images
  */
+#if SEPARATE_CODE_AND_RODATA
+extern unsigned long __TEXT_START__;
+extern unsigned long __TEXT_END__;
+extern unsigned long __RODATA_START__;
+extern unsigned long __RODATA_END__;
+#else
 extern unsigned long __RO_START__;
 extern unsigned long __RO_END__;
+#endif
+
 #if IMAGE_BL2
 extern unsigned long __BL2_END__;
 #elif IMAGE_BL2U