Linux Kernel up to 6.12.57/6.17.7 lib/refcount.c drm_put_dev use after free

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability classified as critical has been found in Linux Kernel up to 6.12.57/6.17.7. The affected element is the function drm_put_dev in the library lib/refcount.c. This manipulation causes use after free. This vulnerability is tracked as CVE-2025-68181. No exploit exists. It is recommended to upgrade the affected component.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability classified as critical was found in Linux Kernel up to 6.12.57/6.17.7. Affected by this vulnerability is the function drm_put_dev in the library lib/refcount.c. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a use after free vulnerability. The CWE definition for the vulnerability is CWE-416. Referencing memory after it has been freed can cause a program to crash, use unexpected values, or execute code. 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: drm/radeon: Remove calls to drm_put_dev() Since the allocation of the drivers main structure was changed to devm_drm_dev_alloc() drm_put_dev()'ing to trigger it to be free'd should be done by devres. However, drm_put_dev() is still in the probe error and device remove paths. When the driver fails to probe warnings like the following are shown because devres is trying to drm_put_dev() after the driver already did it. [ 5.642230] radeon 0000:01:05.0: probe with driver radeon failed with error -22 [ 5.649605] ------------[ cut here ]------------ [ 5.649607] refcount_t: underflow; use-after-free. [ 5.649620] WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: 357 at lib/refcount.c:28 refcount_warn_saturate+0xbe/0x110 (cherry picked from commit 3eb8c0b4c091da0a623ade0d3ee7aa4a93df1ea4)

It is possible to read the advisory at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is known as CVE-2025-68181 since 12/16/2025. 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 02/21/2026).

The vulnerability scanner Nessus provides a plugin with the ID 298897 (Ubuntu 25.10 : Linux kernel vulnerabilities (USN-8029-1)), which helps to determine the existence of the flaw in a target environment.

Upgrading to version 6.12.58 or 6.17.8 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 2fa41445d8c98f2a65503c373796466496edc0e7/ec18f6b2c743cc471b2539ddb5caed20a012e640/745bae76acdd71709773c129a69deca01036250b 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 (298897) and CERT Bund (WID-SEC-2025-2868). Be aware that VulDB is the high quality source for vulnerability data.

Affected

• Debian Linux
• Amazon Linux 2
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• Ubuntu Linux
• SUSE Linux
• Oracle Linux
• SUSE openSUSE
• RESF Rocky Linux
• Open Source Linux Kernel

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 6.12.0
• 6.12.1
• 6.12.2
• 6.12.3
• 6.12.4
• 6.12.5
• 6.12.6
• 6.12.7
• 6.12.8
• 6.12.9
• 6.12.10
• 6.12.11
• 6.12.12
• 6.12.13
• 6.12.14
• 6.12.15
• 6.12.16
• 6.12.17
• 6.12.18
• 6.12.19
• 6.12.20
• 6.12.21
• 6.12.22
• 6.12.23
• 6.12.24
• 6.12.25
• 6.12.26
• 6.12.27
• 6.12.28
• 6.12.29
• 6.12.30
• 6.12.31
• 6.12.32
• 6.12.33
• 6.12.34
• 6.12.35
• 6.12.36
• 6.12.37
• 6.12.38
• 6.12.39
• 6.12.40
• 6.12.41
• 6.12.42
• 6.12.43
• 6.12.44
• 6.12.45
• 6.12.46
• 6.12.47
• 6.12.48
• 6.12.49
• 6.12.50
• 6.12.51
• 6.12.52
• 6.12.53
• 6.12.54
• 6.12.55
• 6.12.56
• 6.12.57
• 6.17.0
• 6.17.1
• 6.17.2
• 6.17.3
• 6.17.4
• 6.17.5
• 6.17.6
• 6.17.7

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

CPE 2.3info

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Entryinfo

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