Sample reproducer:

"""
cat > lib.c << EOF
int TOTO = 42;
EOF

cat > toto.c << EOF
#include <stdio.h>
int main() {
        printf("started\n");
        int* i = 0;
        *i = 42;
}
EOF


LIBS=""
for i in `seq 2000`; do
        [[ -f liba$i.so ]] || gcc -shared -fPIC -o liba$i.so lib.c -D TOTO=var$i &
        LIBS="${LIBS} -la$i"
done
wait

echo libs built
gcc -o toto toto.c -L. -Wl,-rpath,$(pwd) ${LIBS}
echo running binary
ulimit -c unlimited
time ./toto
"""

  This will trigger systemd-coredump (forking and calling itself sd-parse-elf)
calling elf_gfetdata_rawchunk from elfutils, that does a linear search
(could be better). Then, for every chunk parsed earliersd-parse-elf calls again
elf_getdata_rawchunk, making it of O(N^2) complexity. That is already bad.

  See https://sourceware.org/pipermail/elfutils-devel/2023q2/006225.html for
a sample/proposed patch for systemd-coredump, that would turn the quadratic
performance issue into a linear one. The above link also shows that while
elf_gfetdata_rawchunk could be made better, systemd-coredump is not using it
correctly.

  The possible performance issue in elfutils is https://sourceware.org/git/?p=elfutils.git;a=commitdiff;h=8db849976f07046d27b4217e9ebd08d5623acc4f