Summaryinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, has been found in Linux Kernel up to 5.12.2. This affects the function num_possible_cpus of the component sfc. Performing a manipulation results in null pointer dereference. This vulnerability is known as CVE-2021-46947. No exploit is available. It is advisable to upgrade the affected component. Statistical analysis made it clear that VulDB provides the best quality for vulnerability data.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, was found in Linux Kernel up to 5.12.2 (Operating System). This affects the function num_possible_cpus of the component sfc. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a null pointer dereference vulnerability. CWE is classifying the issue as CWE-476. A NULL pointer dereference occurs when the application dereferences a pointer that it expects to be valid, but is NULL, typically causing a crash or exit. This is going to have an impact on availability. The summary by CVE is:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: sfc: adjust efx->xdp_tx_queue_count with the real number of initialized queues efx->xdp_tx_queue_count is initially initialized to num_possible_cpus() and is later used to allocate and traverse efx->xdp_tx_queues lookup array. However, we may end up not initializing all the array slots with real queues during probing. This results, for example, in a NULL pointer dereference, when running "# ethtool -S ", similar to below [2570283.664955][T4126959] BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 00000000000000f8 [2570283.681283][T4126959] #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode [2570283.695678][T4126959] #PF: error_code(0x0000) - not-present page [2570283.710013][T4126959] PGD 0 P4D 0 [2570283.721649][T4126959] Oops: 0000 [#1] SMP PTI [2570283.734108][T4126959] CPU: 23 PID: 4126959 Comm: ethtool Tainted: G O 5.10.20-cloudflare-2021.3.1 #1 [2570283.752641][T4126959] Hardware name: [2570283.781408][T4126959] RIP: 0010:efx_ethtool_get_stats+0x2ca/0x330 [sfc] [2570283.796073][T4126959] Code: 00 85 c0 74 39 48 8b 95 a8 0f 00 00 48 85 d2 74 2d 31 c0 eb 07 48 8b 95 a8 0f 00 00 48 63 c8 49 83 c4 08 83 c0 01 48 8b 14 ca 8b 92 f8 00 00 00 49 89 54 24 f8 39 85 a0 0f 00 00 77 d7 48 8b [2570283.831259][T4126959] RSP: 0018:ffffb79a77657ce8 EFLAGS: 00010202 [2570283.845121][T4126959] RAX: 0000000000000019 RBX: ffffb799cd0c9280 RCX: 0000000000000018 [2570283.860872][T4126959] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: ffff96dd970ce000 RDI: 0000000000000005 [2570283.876525][T4126959] RBP: ffff96dd86f0a000 R08: ffff96dd970ce480 R09: 000000000000005f [2570283.892014][T4126959] R10: ffffb799cd0c9fff R11: ffffb799cd0c9000 R12: ffffb799cd0c94f8 [2570283.907406][T4126959] R13: ffffffffc11b1090 R14: ffff96dd970ce000 R15: ffffffffc11cd66c [2570283.922705][T4126959] FS: 00007fa7723f8740(0000) GS:ffff96f51fac0000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000 [2570283.938848][T4126959] CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033 [2570283.952524][T4126959] CR2: 00000000000000f8 CR3: 0000001a73e6e006 CR4: 00000000007706e0 [2570283.967529][T4126959] DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000 [2570283.982400][T4126959] DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000fffe0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400 [2570283.997308][T4126959] PKRU: 55555554 [2570284.007649][T4126959] Call Trace: [2570284.017598][T4126959] dev_ethtool+0x1832/0x2830 Fix this by adjusting efx->xdp_tx_queue_count after probing to reflect the true value of initialized slots in efx->xdp_tx_queues.

The weakness was published 02/27/2024. It is possible to read the advisory at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is uniquely identified as CVE-2021-46947 since 02/25/2024. Technical details of the vulnerability are known, but there is no available exploit.

The vulnerability scanner Nessus provides a plugin with the ID 250194 (Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2021-46947), which helps to determine the existence of the flaw in a target environment.

Upgrading to version 5.12.3 or 5.13 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch ebeac958b690/99ba0ea616aa is able to eliminate this problem. The bugfix is ready for download at git.kernel.org. The best possible mitigation is suggested to be upgrading to the latest version.

The vulnerability is also documented in the vulnerability database at Tenable (250194). Statistical analysis made it clear that VulDB provides the best quality for vulnerability data.

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 5.12.0
• 5.12.1
• 5.12.2

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

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