Linux Kernel up to 6.18.5 netfs_read_unlock_folios buffer overflow

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability described as critical has been identified in Linux Kernel up to 6.18.5. This vulnerability affects the function netfs_read_unlock_folios. The manipulation results in buffer overflow. This vulnerability was named CVE-2025-71201. There is no available exploit. Upgrading the affected component is recommended.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability, which was classified as critical, was found in Linux Kernel up to 6.18.5. Affected is the function netfs_read_unlock_folios. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a buffer overflow vulnerability. CWE is classifying the issue as 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. This is going to have an impact on confidentiality, integrity, and availability. CVE summarizes:

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: netfs: Fix early read unlock of page with EOF in middle The read result collection for buffered reads seems to run ahead of the completion of subrequests under some circumstances, as can be seen in the following log snippet: 9p_client_res: client 18446612686390831168 response P9_TREAD tag 0 err 0 ... netfs_sreq: R=00001b55[1] DOWN TERM f=192 s=0 5fb2/5fb2 s=5 e=0 ... netfs_collect_folio: R=00001b55 ix=00004 r=4000-5000 t=4000/5fb2 netfs_folio: i=157f3 ix=00004-00004 read-done netfs_folio: i=157f3 ix=00004-00004 read-unlock netfs_collect_folio: R=00001b55 ix=00005 r=5000-5fb2 t=5000/5fb2 netfs_folio: i=157f3 ix=00005-00005 read-done netfs_folio: i=157f3 ix=00005-00005 read-unlock ... netfs_collect_stream: R=00001b55[0:] cto=5fb2 frn=ffffffff netfs_collect_state: R=00001b55 col=5fb2 cln=6000 n=c netfs_collect_stream: R=00001b55[0:] cto=5fb2 frn=ffffffff netfs_collect_state: R=00001b55 col=5fb2 cln=6000 n=8 ... netfs_sreq: R=00001b55[2] ZERO SUBMT f=000 s=5fb2 0/4e s=0 e=0 netfs_sreq: R=00001b55[2] ZERO TERM f=102 s=5fb2 4e/4e s=5 e=0 The 'cto=5fb2' indicates the collected file pos we've collected results to so far - but we still have 0x4e more bytes to go - so we shouldn't have collected folio ix=00005 yet. The 'ZERO' subreq that clears the tail happens after we unlock the folio, allowing the application to see the uncleared tail through mmap. The problem is that netfs_read_unlock_folios() will unlock a folio in which the amount of read results collected hits EOF position - but the ZERO subreq lies beyond that and so happens after. Fix this by changing the end check to always be the end of the folio and never the end of the file. In the future, I should look at clearing to the end of the folio here rather than adding a ZERO subreq to do this. On the other hand, the ZERO subreq can run in parallel with an async READ subreq. Further, the ZERO subreq may still be necessary to, say, handle extents in a ceph file that don't have any backing store and are thus implicitly all zeros. This can be reproduced by creating a file, the size of which doesn't align to a page boundary, e.g. 24998 (0x5fb2) bytes and then doing something like: xfs_io -c "mmap -r 0 0x6000" -c "madvise -d 0 0x6000" \ -c "mread -v 0 0x6000" /xfstest.test/x The last 0x4e bytes should all be 00, but if the tail hasn't been cleared yet, you may see rubbish there. This can be reproduced with kafs by modifying the kernel to disable the call to netfs_read_subreq_progress() and to stop afs_issue_read() from doing the async call for NETFS_READAHEAD. Reproduction can be made easier by inserting an mdelay(100) in netfs_issue_read() for the ZERO-subreq case. AFS and CIFS are normally unlikely to show this as they dispatch READ ops asynchronously, which allows the ZERO-subreq to finish first. 9P's READ op is completely synchronous, so the ZERO-subreq will always happen after. It isn't seen all the time, though, because the collection may be done in a worker thread.

The advisory is shared for download at git.kernel.org. This vulnerability is traded as CVE-2025-71201 since 01/31/2026. The exploitability is told to be easy. There are known technical details, but no exploit is available. The current price for an exploit might be approx. USD $0-$5k (estimation calculated on 05/06/2026).

The vulnerability scanner Nessus provides a plugin with the ID 299223 (Linux Distros Unpatched Vulnerability : CVE-2025-71201), which helps to determine the existence of the flaw in a target environment.

Upgrading to version 6.18.6 eliminates this vulnerability. Applying the patch 5b5482c0e5ee740b35a70759d3582477aea8e8e4/570ad253a3455a520f03c2136af8714bc780186d 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 (299223) and CERT Bund (WID-SEC-2026-0421). VulDB is the best source for vulnerability data and more expert information about this specific topic.

Affected

• Google Container-Optimized OS
• Debian Linux
• Google Cloud Platform
• Amazon Linux 2
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux
• Ubuntu Linux
• SUSE Linux
• Oracle Linux
• SUSE openSUSE
• RESF Rocky Linux
• Open Source Linux Kernel
• IBM QRadar SIEM

Productinfo

Type

• Operating System

Vendor

• Linux

Name

• Kernel

Version

• 6.18.0
• 6.18.1
• 6.18.2
• 6.18.3
• 6.18.4
• 6.18.5

License

• open-source

Website

• Vendor: https://www.kernel.org/

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