NULL pointer dereference in Linux

CVE-2023-53079

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/mlx5: Fix steering rules cleanup vport's mc, uc and multicast rules are not deleted in teardown path when EEH happens. Since the vport's promisc settings(uc, mc and all) in firmware are reset after EEH, mlx5 driver will try to delete the above rules in the initialization path. This cause kernel crash because these software rules are no longer valid. Fix by nullifying these rules right after delete to avoid accessing any dangling pointers. Call Trace: __list_del_entry_valid+0xcc/0x100 (unreliable) tree_put_node+0xf4/0x1b0 [mlx5_core] tree_remove_node+0x30/0x70 [mlx5_core] mlx5_del_flow_rules+0x14c/0x1f0 [mlx5_core] esw_apply_vport_rx_mode+0x10c/0x200 [mlx5_core] esw_update_vport_rx_mode+0xb4/0x180 [mlx5_core] esw_vport_change_handle_locked+0x1ec/0x230 [mlx5_core] esw_enable_vport+0x130/0x260 [mlx5_core] mlx5_eswitch_enable_sriov+0x2a0/0x2f0 [mlx5_core] mlx5_device_enable_sriov+0x74/0x440 [mlx5_core] mlx5_load_one+0x114c/0x1550 [mlx5_core] mlx5_pci_resume+0x68/0xf0 [mlx5_core] eeh_report_resume+0x1a4/0x230 eeh_pe_dev_traverse+0x98/0x170 eeh_handle_normal_event+0x3e4/0x640 eeh_handle_event+0x4c/0x370 eeh_event_handler+0x14c/0x210 kthread+0x168/0x1b0 ret_from_kernel_thread+0x5c/0x84

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 (10.8th percentile), scored .

Very low probability of exploitation in the next 30 days; routine patching cadence is appropriate. 11th percentile — 10.8% 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-2023-53079: 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 a35f71f27a614aff106cc89b86168962bce2725f, 4.7, 0
  • Linux Kernel — versions 6.3

Weakness classification (CWE)

References

Frequently asked questions

What is CVE-2023-53079?
CVE-2023-53079 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux, classified under NULL Pointer Dereference. CVSS score: 5.5/10. Published 2025-05-02.
How severe is CVE-2023-53079?
Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.5 out of 10.