Linux Kernel up to 6.1.38/6.3.12/6.4.3 dev_pm_qos_hide_latency_tolerance memory leak

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability categorized as critical has been discovered in Linux Kernel up to 6.1.38/6.3.12/6.4.3. Affected is the function dev_pm_qos_hide_latency_tolerance. Such manipulation leads to memory leak. This vulnerability is traded as CVE-2023-53670. There is no exploit available. It is advisable to upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability was found in Linux Kernel up to 6.1.38/6.3.12/6.4.3 and classified as critical. Affected by this issue is the function dev_pm_qos_hide_latency_tolerance. 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: nvme-core: fix dev_pm_qos memleak Call dev_pm_qos_hide_latency_tolerance() in the error unwind patch to avoid following kmemleak:- blktests (master) # kmemleak-clear; ./check nvme/044; blktests (master) # kmemleak-scan ; kmemleak-show nvme/044 (Test bi-directional authentication) [passed] runtime 2.111s ... 2.124s unreferenced object 0xffff888110c46240 (size 96): comm "nvme", pid 33461, jiffies 4345365353 (age 75.586s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ backtrace: [<0000000069ac2cec>] kmalloc_trace+0x25/0x90 [<000000006acc66d5>] dev_pm_qos_update_user_latency_tolerance+0x6f/0x100 [<00000000cc376ea7>] nvme_init_ctrl+0x38e/0x410 [nvme_core] [<000000007df61b4b>] 0xffffffffc05e88b3 [<00000000d152b985>] 0xffffffffc05744cb [<00000000f04a4041>] vfs_write+0xc5/0x3c0 [<00000000f9491baf>] ksys_write+0x5f/0xe0 [<000000001c46513d>] do_syscall_64+0x3b/0x90 [<00000000ecf348fe>] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x72/0xdc

The advisory is shared for download at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is handled as CVE-2023-53670 since 10/07/2025. The exploitation is known to be easy. There are known technical details, but no exploit is available.

Upgrading to version 6.1.39, 6.3.13 or 6.4.4 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch e1379e067b9485e5af03399fe3f0d39bccb023ad/7237c26431cc78e5ec3259f4350f3dd58f6a4319/2ed9a89192e3192e5fea7ff6475c8722513f325e/7ed5cf8e6d9bfb6a78d0471317edff14f0f2b4dd 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 EUVD (EUVD-2025-31954) and CERT Bund (WID-SEC-2025-2229). Once again VulDB remains the best source for vulnerability data.

Affected

• Amazon Linux 2
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• SUSE Linux
• Oracle Linux
• RESF Rocky Linux
• Open Source Linux Kernel
• IBM QRadar SIEM
• Dell NetWorker

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 6.1.0
• 6.1.1
• 6.1.2
• 6.1.3
• 6.1.4
• 6.1.5
• 6.1.6
• 6.1.7
• 6.1.8
• 6.1.9
• 6.1.10
• 6.1.11
• 6.1.12
• 6.1.13
• 6.1.14
• 6.1.15
• 6.1.16
• 6.1.17
• 6.1.18
• 6.1.19
• 6.1.20
• 6.1.21
• 6.1.22
• 6.1.23
• 6.1.24
• 6.1.25
• 6.1.26
• 6.1.27
• 6.1.28
• 6.1.29
• 6.1.30
• 6.1.31
• 6.1.32
• 6.1.33
• 6.1.34
• 6.1.35
• 6.1.36
• 6.1.37
• 6.1.38
• 6.3.0
• 6.3.1
• 6.3.2
• 6.3.3
• 6.3.4
• 6.3.5
• 6.3.6
• 6.3.7
• 6.3.8
• 6.3.9
• 6.3.10
• 6.3.11
• 6.3.12
• 6.4.0
• 6.4.1
• 6.4.2
• 6.4.3

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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