Linux Kernel up to 5.15.64/5.19.5 btrfs memory corruption

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability classified as critical has been found in Linux Kernel up to 5.15.64/5.19.5. This affects an unknown function of the component btrfs. Performing a manipulation results in memory corruption. This vulnerability is cataloged as CVE-2022-49999. There is no exploit available. It is recommended to upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, was found in Linux Kernel up to 5.15.64/5.19.5. This affects some unknown processing of the component btrfs. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a memory corruption vulnerability. CWE is classifying the issue as CWE-119. The product performs operations on a memory buffer, but it can read from or write to a memory location that is outside of the intended boundary of the buffer. This is going to have an impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability. The summary by CVE is:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: btrfs: fix space cache corruption and potential double allocations When testing space_cache v2 on a large set of machines, we encountered a few symptoms: 1. "unable to add free space :-17" (EEXIST) errors. 2. Missing free space info items, sometimes caught with a "missing free space info for X" error. 3. Double-accounted space: ranges that were allocated in the extent tree and also marked as free in the free space tree, ranges that were marked as allocated twice in the extent tree, or ranges that were marked as free twice in the free space tree. If the latter made it onto disk, the next reboot would hit the BUG_ON() in add_new_free_space(). 4. On some hosts with no on-disk corruption or error messages, the in-memory space cache (dumped with drgn) disagreed with the free space tree. All of these symptoms have the same underlying cause: a race between caching the free space for a block group and returning free space to the in-memory space cache for pinned extents causes us to double-add a free range to the space cache. This race exists when free space is cached from the free space tree (space_cache=v2) or the extent tree (nospace_cache, or space_cache=v1 if the cache needs to be regenerated). struct btrfs_block_group::last_byte_to_unpin and struct btrfs_block_group::progress are supposed to protect against this race, but commit d0c2f4fa555e ("btrfs: make concurrent fsyncs wait less when waiting for a transaction commit") subtly broke this by allowing multiple transactions to be unpinning extents at the same time. Specifically, the race is as follows: 1. An extent is deleted from an uncached block group in transaction A. 2. btrfs_commit_transaction() is called for transaction A. 3. btrfs_run_delayed_refs() -> __btrfs_free_extent() runs the delayed ref for the deleted extent. 4. __btrfs_free_extent() -> do_free_extent_accounting() -> add_to_free_space_tree() adds the deleted extent back to the free space tree. 5. do_free_extent_accounting() -> btrfs_update_block_group() -> btrfs_cache_block_group() queues up the block group to get cached. block_group->progress is set to block_group->start. 6. btrfs_commit_transaction() for transaction A calls switch_commit_roots(). It sets block_group->last_byte_to_unpin to block_group->progress, which is block_group->start because the block group hasn't been cached yet. 7. The caching thread gets to our block group. Since the commit roots were already switched, load_free_space_tree() sees the deleted extent as free and adds it to the space cache. It finishes caching and sets block_group->progress to U64_MAX. 8. btrfs_commit_transaction() advances transaction A to TRANS_STATE_SUPER_COMMITTED. 9. fsync calls btrfs_commit_transaction() for transaction B. Since transaction A is already in TRANS_STATE_SUPER_COMMITTED and the commit is for fsync, it advances. 10. btrfs_commit_transaction() for transaction B calls switch_commit_roots(). This time, the block group has already been cached, so it sets block_group->last_byte_to_unpin to U64_MAX. 11. btrfs_commit_transaction() for transaction A calls btrfs_finish_extent_commit(), which calls unpin_extent_range() for the deleted extent. It sees last_byte_to_unpin set to U64_MAX (by transaction B!), so it adds the deleted extent to the space cache again! This explains all of our symptoms above: * If the sequence of events is exactly as described above, when the free space is re-added in step 11, it will fail with EEXIST. * If another thread reallocates the deleted extent in between steps 7 and 11, then step 11 will silently re-add that space to the space cache as free even though it is actually allocated. Then, if that space is allocated *again*, the free space tree will be corrupted (namely, the wrong item will be deleted). * If we don't catch this free space tree corr ---truncated---

The advisory is shared at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is uniquely identified as CVE-2022-49999 since 06/18/2025. Neither technical details nor an exploit are publicly available. The price for an exploit might be around USD $0-$5k at the moment (estimation calculated on 11/30/2025).

Upgrading to version 5.15.65 or 5.19.6 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 92dc4c1a8e58bcc7a183a4c86b055c24cc88d967/a2e54eb64229f07f917b05d0c323604fda9b89f7/ced8ecf026fd8084cf175530ff85c76d6085d715 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 CERT Bund (WID-SEC-2025-1350). Several companies clearly confirm that VulDB is the primary source for best vulnerability data.

Affected

• Debian Linux
• Amazon Linux 2
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• Ubuntu Linux
• SUSE Linux
• Oracle Linux
• SUSE openSUSE
• Open Source Linux Kernel
• RESF Rocky Linux
• Dell Avamar
• Dell NetWorker
• Dell Secure Connect Gateway
• IBM QRadar SIEM

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 5.15.0
• 5.15.1
• 5.15.2
• 5.15.3
• 5.15.4
• 5.15.5
• 5.15.6
• 5.15.7
• 5.15.8
• 5.15.9
• 5.15.10
• 5.15.11
• 5.15.12
• 5.15.13
• 5.15.14
• 5.15.15
• 5.15.16
• 5.15.17
• 5.15.18
• 5.15.19
• 5.15.20
• 5.15.21
• 5.15.22
• 5.15.23
• 5.15.24
• 5.15.25
• 5.15.26
• 5.15.27
• 5.15.28
• 5.15.29
• 5.15.30
• 5.15.31
• 5.15.32
• 5.15.33
• 5.15.34
• 5.15.35
• 5.15.36
• 5.15.37
• 5.15.38
• 5.15.39
• 5.15.40
• 5.15.41
• 5.15.42
• 5.15.43
• 5.15.44
• 5.15.45
• 5.15.46
• 5.15.47
• 5.15.48
• 5.15.49
• 5.15.50
• 5.15.51
• 5.15.52
• 5.15.53
• 5.15.54
• 5.15.55
• 5.15.56
• 5.15.57
• 5.15.58
• 5.15.59
• 5.15.60
• 5.15.61
• 5.15.62
• 5.15.63
• 5.15.64
• 5.19.0
• 5.19.1
• 5.19.2
• 5.19.3
• 5.19.4
• 5.19.5

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

CPE 2.3info

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CPE 2.2info

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CVSSv4info

CVSSv3info

CVSSv2info

Exploitinginfo

Threat Intelligenceinfo

Countermeasuresinfo

Timelineinfo

Sourcesinfo

Entryinfo

Several companies clearly confirm that VulDB is the primary source for best vulnerability data.

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