Use After Free in Linux
CVE-2025-38722
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: habanalabs: fix UAF in export_dmabuf() As soon as we'd inserted a file reference into descriptor table, another thread could close it. That's fine for the case when all we are doing is returning that descriptor to userland (it's a race, but it's a userland race and there's nothing the kernel can do about it). However, if we follow fd_install() with any kind of access to objects that would be destroyed on close (be it the struct file itself or anything destroyed by its ->release()), we have a UAF. dma_buf_fd() is a combination of reserving a descriptor and fd_install(). habanalabs export_dmabuf() calls it and then proceeds to access the objects destroyed on close. In particular, it grabs an extra reference to another struct file that will be dropped as part of ->release() for ours; that "will be" is actually "might have already been". Fix that by reserving descriptor before anything else and do fd_install() only when everything had been set up. As a side benefit, we no longer have the failure exit with file already created, but reference to underlying file (as well as ->dmabuf_export_cnt, etc.) not grabbed yet; unlike dma_buf_fd(), fd_install() can't fail.
Vulnerability class: Use-After-Free
EPSS: 0.002 (4.9th percentile) — read the EPSS interpretation.
CVSS v3 metric
CVSS v3 base score 7.8 (High). Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.
Affected products
- Linux — versions db1a8dd916aac986871f6b873a3aefad906f383a, 5.16, 0
- Linux Linux_kernel — versions 6.17
Weakness classification (CWE)
References
Frequently asked questions
- What is CVE-2025-38722?
- CVE-2025-38722 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux, classified under Use After Free. CVSS score: 7.8/10. Published 2025-09-04.
- How severe is CVE-2025-38722?
- High severity. CVSS v3 base score is 7.8 out of 10.