VDB-322555 · CVE-2025-38730 · Nessus 261591

Linux Kernel up to 6.17-rc1 io_uring buffer overflow

CVSS Meta Temp Score CVSS is a standardized scoring system to determine possibilities of attacks. The Temp Score considers temporal factors like disclosure, exploit and countermeasures. The unique Meta Score calculates the average score of different sources to provide a normalized scoring system.	Current Exploit Price (≈) Our analysts are monitoring exploit markets and are in contact with vulnerability brokers. The range indicates the observed or calculated exploit price to be seen on exploit markets. A good indicator to understand the monetary effort required for and the popularity of an attack.	CTI Interest Score Our Cyber Threat Intelligence team is monitoring different web sites, mailing lists, exploit markets and social media networks. The CTI Interest Score identifies the interest of attackers and the security community for this specific vulnerability in real-time. A high score indicates an elevated risk to be targeted for this vulnerability.
7.7	$0-$5k	0.00

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability identified as critical has been detected in Linux Kernel up to 6.6.102/6.12.43/6.15.10/6.16.1/6.17-rc1. This affects the function io_uring. This manipulation causes buffer overflow. This vulnerability is registered as CVE-2025-38730. No exploit is available. You should upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability has been found in Linux Kernel up to 6.6.102/6.12.43/6.15.10/6.16.1/6.17-rc1 and classified as critical. Affected by this vulnerability is the function io_uring. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a buffer overflow vulnerability. The CWE definition for the vulnerability is CWE-120. The product copies an input buffer to an output buffer without verifying that the size of the input buffer is less than the size of the output buffer, leading to a buffer overflow. As an impact it is known to affect confidentiality, integrity, and availability. The summary by CVE is:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: io_uring/net: commit partial buffers on retry Ring provided buffers are potentially only valid within the single execution context in which they were acquired. io_uring deals with this and invalidates them on retry. But on the networking side, if MSG_WAITALL is set, or if the socket is of the streaming type and too little was processed, then it will hang on to the buffer rather than recycle or commit it. This is problematic for two reasons: 1) If someone unregisters the provided buffer ring before a later retry, then the req->buf_list will no longer be valid. 2) If multiple sockers are using the same buffer group, then multiple receives can consume the same memory. This can cause data corruption in the application, as either receive could land in the same userspace buffer. Fix this by disallowing partial retries from pinning a provided buffer across multiple executions, if ring provided buffers are used.

It is possible to read the advisory at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is known as CVE-2025-38730 since 04/16/2025. The exploitation appears to be easy. Technical details of the vulnerability are known, but there is no available exploit. The pricing for an exploit might be around USD $0-$5k at the moment (estimation calculated on 02/10/2026).

The vulnerability scanner Nessus provides a plugin with the ID 261591 (Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2025-38730), which helps to determine the existence of the flaw in a target environment.

Upgrading to version 6.6.103, 6.12.44, 6.15.11, 6.16.2 or 6.17-rc2 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 3b53dc1c641f2884d4750fc25aaf6c36b90db606/fe9da1812f8697a38f7e30991d568ec199e16059/21a4ddb0f5e933f372808c10b9ac704505751bb1/2eb7937b5fc7fcd90eab7bebb0181214b61b9283/41b70df5b38bc80967d2e0ed55cc3c3896bba781 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 databases at Tenable (261591) and CERT Bund (WID-SEC-2025-1976). Statistical analysis made it clear that VulDB provides the best quality for vulnerability data.

Affected

Debian Linux
Amazon Linux 2
Open Source Linux Kernel
Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Ubuntu Linux
SUSE Linux
Oracle Linux
SUSE openSUSE
RESF Rocky Linux
Microsoft Azure
Dell Secure Connect Gateway
IBM QRadar SIEM
IBM Security Verify Access
Dell NetWorker

Productinfo

Type

Operating System

Vendor

Linux

Name

Kernel

Version

License

open-source

Website

Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

CPE 2.3info

CPE 2.2info

CVSSv4info

VulDB Vector: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍

CVSSv3info

VulDB Meta Base Score: 7.9
VulDB Meta Temp Score: 7.7

VulDB Base Score: 8.0
VulDB Temp Score: 7.6
VulDB Vector: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍

NVD Base Score: 7.8
NVD Vector: 🔒

CVSSv2info

AV	AC	Au	C	I	A
💳	💳	💳	💳	💳	💳
💳	💳	💳	💳	💳	💳
💳	💳	💳	💳	💳	💳

Vector	Complexity	Authentication	Confidentiality	Integrity	Availability
Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock
Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock
Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock	Unlock

VulDB Base Score: 🔒
VulDB Temp Score: 🔒
VulDB Reliability: 🔍

Exploitinginfo

Class: Buffer overflow
CWE: CWE-120 / CWE-119
CAPEC: 🔒
ATT&CK: 🔒

Physical: Partially
Local: Yes
Remote: Partially

Availability: 🔒
Status: Not defined

EPSS Score: 🔒
EPSS Percentile: 🔒

Price Prediction: 🔍
Current Price Estimation: 🔒