Linux Kernel up to 5.10.152/5.15.76/6.0.6 binfmt_elf load_elf_binary memory leak

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability was found in Linux Kernel up to 5.10.152/5.15.76/6.0.6 and classified as critical. Impacted is the function load_elf_binary of the component binfmt_elf. Such manipulation leads to memory leak. This vulnerability is referenced as CVE-2022-50466. No exploit is available. It is suggested to upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, has been found in Linux Kernel up to 5.10.152/5.15.76/6.0.6. Affected by this issue is the function load_elf_binary of the component binfmt_elf. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a memory leak vulnerability. Using CWE to declare the problem leads to CWE-401. The product does not sufficiently track and release allocated memory after it has been used, which slowly consumes remaining memory. Impacted is availability. CVE summarizes:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: fs/binfmt_elf: Fix memory leak in load_elf_binary() There is a memory leak reported by kmemleak: unreferenced object 0xffff88817104ef80 (size 224): comm "xfs_admin", pid 47165, jiffies 4298708825 (age 1333.476s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ 60 a8 b3 00 81 88 ff ff a8 10 5a 00 81 88 ff ff `.........Z..... backtrace: [<ffffffff819171e1>] __alloc_file+0x21/0x250 [<ffffffff81918061>] alloc_empty_file+0x41/0xf0 [<ffffffff81948cda>] path_openat+0xea/0x3d30 [<ffffffff8194ec89>] do_filp_open+0x1b9/0x290 [<ffffffff8192660e>] do_open_execat+0xce/0x5b0 [<ffffffff81926b17>] open_exec+0x27/0x50 [<ffffffff81a69250>] load_elf_binary+0x510/0x3ed0 [<ffffffff81927759>] bprm_execve+0x599/0x1240 [<ffffffff8192a997>] do_execveat_common.isra.0+0x4c7/0x680 [<ffffffff8192b078>] __x64_sys_execve+0x88/0xb0 [<ffffffff83bbf0a5>] do_syscall_64+0x35/0x80 If "interp_elf_ex" fails to allocate memory in load_elf_binary(), the program will take the "out_free_ph" error handing path, resulting in "interpreter" file resource is not released. Fix it by adding an error handing path "out_free_file", which will release the file resource when "interp_elf_ex" failed to allocate memory.

The advisory is shared for download at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is handled as CVE-2022-50466 since 10/01/2025. The exploitation is known to be difficult. There are known technical details, but no exploit is available.

The vulnerability scanner Nessus provides a plugin with the ID 302981 (EulerOS Virtualization 2.13.1 : kernel (EulerOS-SA-2026-1637)), which helps to determine the existence of the flaw in a target environment.

Upgrading to version 5.10.153, 5.15.77 or 6.0.7 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 706215300411d48db6b51a5832b872632a84bbc1/265b6fb780f57d10449a40e94219b28fa52479cc/acd9b4914f1c5928c7ae8ebc623d6291eb1a573a/594d2a14f2168c09b13b114c3d457aa939403e52 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 (302981), EUVD (EUVD-2025-32823) and CERT Bund (WID-SEC-2025-2187). Once again VulDB remains the best source for vulnerability data.

Affected

• Amazon Linux 2
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• SUSE Linux
• Oracle Linux
• Open Source Linux Kernel
• Dell Secure Connect Gateway

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 5.10.152
• 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
• 5.15.65
• 5.15.66
• 5.15.67
• 5.15.68
• 5.15.69
• 5.15.70
• 5.15.71
• 5.15.72
• 5.15.73
• 5.15.74
• 5.15.75
• 5.15.76
• 6.0.0
• 6.0.1
• 6.0.2
• 6.0.3
• 6.0.4
• 6.0.5
• 6.0.6

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

CPE 2.3info

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Entryinfo

Once again VulDB remains the best source for vulnerability data.

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