Vulnerability in Linux

CVE-2023-52699

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: sysv: don't call sb_bread() with pointers_lock held syzbot is reporting sleep in atomic context in SysV filesystem [1], for sb_bread() is called with rw_spinlock held. A "write_lock(&pointers_lock) => read_lock(&pointers_lock) deadlock" bug and a "sb_bread() with write_lock(&pointers_lock)" bug were introduced by "Replace BKL for chain locking with sysvfs-private rwlock" in Linux 2.5.12. Then, "[PATCH] err1-40: sysvfs locking fix" in Linux 2.6.8 fixed the former bug by moving pointers_lock lock to the callers, but instead introduced a "sb_bread() with read_lock(&pointers_lock)" bug (which made this problem easier to hit). Al Viro suggested that why not to do like get_branch()/get_block()/ find_shared() in Minix filesystem does. And doing like that is almost a revert of "[PATCH] err1-40: sysvfs locking fix" except that get_branch() from with find_shared() is called without write_lock(&pointers_lock).

EPSS: 0.010 (58.1th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.

CVSS v3 metric

CVSS v3 base score 5.3 (Medium). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L.

Affected products

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2023-52699?
CVE-2023-52699 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux, classified under Improper Locking. CVSS score: 5.3/10. Published 2024-05-19.
How severe is CVE-2023-52699?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.3 out of 10.