Comment 27 for bug 1124250

The ubuntu kernel uses the same values as the upstream kernel in regards to these values. They are tunable for exactly this kind of case.

I brought this case up with the Ubuntu Kernel team, and unfortunately due to the fact that this could potentially be used in a memory-exhaustion, denial of service type attack we will not be changing from the default values. That being said if the mainline kernel decides to change the defaults we would definitely consider following mainline. For most machines raising these default values isn't an issue. However since Ubuntu is so prevalent in virtualized environments where memory is more restricted we will not be changing these values.

If you feel strongly that these values need to be changed please pursue with the mainline linux maintainers.