In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
netlink: avoid infinite retry looping in netlink_unicast()
netlink_attachskb() checks for the socket's read memory allocation constraints. Firstly, it has:
rmem < READONCE(sk->skrcvbuf)
to check if the just increased rmem value fits into the socket's receive buffer. If not, it proceeds and tries to wait for the memory under:
rmem + skb->truesize > READONCE(sk->skrcvbuf)
The checks don't cover the case when skb->truesize + sk->skrmemalloc is equal to sk->sk_rcvbuf. Thus the function neither successfully accepts these conditions, nor manages to reschedule the task - and is called in retry loop for indefinite time which is caught as:
rcu: INFO: rcusched self-detected stall on CPU rcu: 0-....: (25999 ticks this GP) idle=ef2/1/0x4000000000000000 softirq=262269/262269 fqs=6212 (t=26000 jiffies g=230833 q=259957) NMI backtrace for cpu 0 CPU: 0 PID: 22 Comm: kauditd Not tainted 5.10.240 #68 Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS 1.17.0-4.fc42 04/01/2014 Call Trace: <IRQ> dumpstack lib/dumpstack.c:120 nmicpubacktrace.cold lib/nmibacktrace.c:105 nmitriggercpumaskbacktrace lib/nmibacktrace.c:62 rcudumpcpustacks kernel/rcu/treestall.h:335 rcuschedclockirq.cold kernel/rcu/tree.c:2590 updateprocesstimes kernel/time/timer.c:1953 tickschedhandle kernel/time/tick-sched.c:227 ticksched_timer kernel/time/tick-sched.c:1399 __hrtimerrunqueues kernel/time/hrtimer.c:1652 hrtimer_interrupt kernel/time/hrtimer.c:1717 __sysvecapictimerinterrupt arch/x86/kernel/apic/apic.c:1113 asmcallirqonstack arch/x86/entry/entry64.S:808 </IRQ>
netlinkattachskb net/netlink/afnetlink.c:1234 netlinkunicast net/netlink/afnetlink.c:1349 kauditdsendqueue kernel/audit.c:776 kauditdthread kernel/audit.c:897 kthread kernel/kthread.c:328 retfromfork arch/x86/entry/entry64.S:304
Restore the original behavior of the check which commit in Fixes accidentally missed when restructuring the code.
Found by Linux Verification Center (linuxtesting.org).
{
"osv_generated_from": "https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2025/38xxx/CVE-2025-38727.json",
"cna_assigner": "Linux"
}[
{
"target": {
"function": "netlink_attachskb",
"file": "net/netlink/af_netlink.c"
},
"id": "CVE-2025-38727-84594413",
"digest": {
"function_hash": "265944914468520489195374296066329607418",
"length": 1118.0
},
"source": "https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git@346c820ef5135cf062fa3473da955ef8c5fb6929",
"signature_version": "v1",
"deprecated": false,
"signature_type": "Function"
},
{
"target": {
"file": "net/netlink/af_netlink.c"
},
"id": "CVE-2025-38727-85b17050",
"digest": {
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"source": "https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git@346c820ef5135cf062fa3473da955ef8c5fb6929",
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"https://storage.googleapis.com/cve-osv-conversion/osv-output/CVE-2025-38727.json"