Ask HN: How does the xz backdoor replace RSA_public_decrypt?

• OpenSSL

  150 24,186 9.9 C

  TLS/SSL and crypto library

  

At this point I pretty much understand the entire process on how the xz backdoor came to be: its execution stages, extraction from binary "test" files etc. But one thing puzzles me: how can the ifunc mechanism be used to replace something like RSA_public_decrypt? Granted this probably stems from my lack of understanding of ifunc, but I was under the impression that in order for the ifunc mechanism to work in your code, you have to explicitly mark specific function with multiple implementations with __attribute__ ((ifunc ("the_resolver_function"))). Looking at the source code of the RSA function in question, ifunc attribute isn't present:

https://github.com/openssl/openssl/blob/master/crypto/rsa/rsa_crpt.c#L51

So how does the backdoor actually replace the call? Does this means that the ifunc mechanism can be used to override pretty much anything on the system?

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