sysctl: clean up char buffer arguments

sysctl: clean up char buffer arguments

When writing to a sysctl string, each write, regardless of VFS position,
began writing the string from the start. This meant the contents of
the last write to the sysctl controlled the string contents instead of
the first.

This misbehavior was featured in an exploit against Chrome OS. While it's
not in itself a vulnerability, it's a weirdness that isn't on the mind
of most auditors: "This filter looks correct, the first line written
would not be meaningful to sysctl" doesn't apply here, since the size
of the write and the contents of the final write are what matter when
writing to sysctls.

This adds the sysctl kernel.sysctl_writes_strict to control the write
behavior. The default (0) reports when VFS position is non-0 on a write,
but retains legacy behavior, -1 disables the warning, and 1 enables the
position-respecting behavior.

The long-term plan here is to wait for userspace to be fixed in response
to the new warning and to then switch the default kernel behavior to the
new position-respecting behavior.

This patch (of 4):

The char buffer arguments are needlessly cast in weird places. Clean it up
so things are easier to read.

Signed-off-by: Kees Cook <keescook@chromium.org>
Cc: Randy Dunlap <rdunlap@infradead.org>
Signed-off-by: Andrew Morton <akpm@linux-foundation.org>