Vulnerability in Linux
CVE-2025-37989
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net: phy: leds: fix memory leak A network restart test on a router led to an out-of-memory condition, which was traced to a memory leak in the PHY LED trigger code. The root cause is misuse of the devm API. The registration function (phy_led_triggers_register) is called from phy_attach_direct, not phy_probe, and the unregister function (phy_led_triggers_unregister) is called from phy_detach, not phy_remove. This means the register and unregister functions can be called multiple times for the same PHY device, but devm-allocated memory is not freed until the driver is unbound. This also prevents kmemleak from detecting the leak, as the devm API internally stores the allocated pointer. Fix this by replacing devm_kzalloc/devm_kcalloc with standard kzalloc/kcalloc, and add the corresponding kfree calls in the unregister path.
EPSS: 0.002 (5.8th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.
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.
Affected products
- Linux — versions 2e0bc452f4721520502575362a9cd3c1248d2337, 4.10, 0
- Linux Linux_kernel — versions 6.15
- Debian Debian_linux — versions 11.0
Weakness classification (CWE)
Public proof-of-concept exploits
References
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67 (Patch)
- af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108 (Third Party Advisory)
Frequently asked questions
- What is CVE-2025-37989?
- CVE-2025-37989 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux, classified under Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime. CVSS score: 5.5/10. Published 2025-05-20.
- How severe is CVE-2025-37989?
- Medium severity. CVSS v3 base score is 5.5 out of 10.
- Is CVE-2025-37989 known to be exploited?
- 1 public proof-of-concept repositories are indexed. Not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.