Use After Free in Linux

CVE-2022-50288

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: qlcnic: prevent ->dcb use-after-free on qlcnic_dcb_enable() failure adapter->dcb would get silently freed inside qlcnic_dcb_enable() in case qlcnic_dcb_attach() would return an error, which always happens under OOM conditions. This would lead to use-after-free because both of the existing callers invoke qlcnic_dcb_get_info() on the obtained pointer, which is potentially freed at that point. Propagate errors from qlcnic_dcb_enable(), and instead free the dcb pointer at callsite using qlcnic_dcb_free(). This also removes the now unused qlcnic_clear_dcb_ops() helper, which was a simple wrapper around kfree() also causing memory leaks for partially initialized dcb. Found by Linux Verification Center (linuxtesting.org) with the SVACE static analysis tool.

Vulnerability class: Use-After-Free

Published · last modified .

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 5.5 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H.

EPSS exploit prediction

EPSS: 0.002 (4.3th percentile), scored .

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 4th percentile — 4.3% of CVEs in the catalogue have a lower EPSS than this one. How to read EPSS.

EPSS trend (30 days)EPSS over the last 30 days for CVE-2022-50288: held from 0.002 to 0.002.

EPSS over last 30 days · oldest: 0.002 · newest: 0.002 · change: 0.000

Affected products

  • Linux — versions 3c44bba1d270cb1620b4fe76786d0968118cb86b, 3.14, 0
  • Linux Kernel — versions 6.2

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2022-50288?
CVE-2022-50288 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux, classified under Use After Free. CVSS score: 5.5/10. Published 2025-09-15.
How severe is CVE-2022-50288?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.5 out of 10.