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Fencer Intel
high 7.8

CVE-2021-47656 json

jffs2: fix use-after-free in jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem

published last yr. modified 3mo ago also EUVD-2021-34649

cvss
7.8
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.3%
EPSS 0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 17%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

jffs2: fix use-after-free in jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem

When we mount a jffs2 image, assume that the first few blocks of the image are normal and contain at least one xattr-related inode, but the next block is abnormal. As a result, an error is returned in jffs2_scan_eraseblock(). jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem() is then called in jffs2_build_filesystem() and then again in jffs2_do_fill_super().

Finally we can observe the following report: ================================================================== BUG: KASAN: use-after-free in jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem+0x95/0x6ac Read of size 8 at addr ffff8881243384e0 by task mount/719

Call Trace: dump_stack+0x115/0x16b jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem+0x95/0x6ac jffs2_do_fill_super+0x84f/0xc30 jffs2_fill_super+0x2ea/0x4c0 mtd_get_sb+0x254/0x400 mtd_get_sb_by_nr+0x4f/0xd0 get_tree_mtd+0x498/0x840 jffs2_get_tree+0x25/0x30 vfs_get_tree+0x8d/0x2e0 path_mount+0x50f/0x1e50 do_mount+0x107/0x130 __se_sys_mount+0x1c5/0x2f0 __x64_sys_mount+0xc7/0x160 do_syscall_64+0x45/0x70 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xa9

Allocated by task 719: kasan_save_stack+0x23/0x60 __kasan_kmalloc.constprop.0+0x10b/0x120 kasan_slab_alloc+0x12/0x20 kmem_cache_alloc+0x1c0/0x870 jffs2_alloc_xattr_ref+0x2f/0xa0 jffs2_scan_medium.cold+0x3713/0x4794 jffs2_do_mount_fs.cold+0xa7/0x2253 jffs2_do_fill_super+0x383/0xc30 jffs2_fill_super+0x2ea/0x4c0 [...]

Freed by task 719: kmem_cache_free+0xcc/0x7b0 jffs2_free_xattr_ref+0x78/0x98 jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem+0xa1/0x6ac jffs2_do_mount_fs.cold+0x5e6/0x2253 jffs2_do_fill_super+0x383/0xc30 jffs2_fill_super+0x2ea/0x4c0 [...]

The buggy address belongs to the object at ffff8881243384b8 which belongs to the cache jffs2_xattr_ref of size 48 The buggy address is located 40 bytes inside of 48-byte region [ffff8881243384b8, ffff8881243384e8) [...] ==================================================================

The triggering of the BUG is shown in the following stack: ----------------------------------------------------------- jffs2_fill_super jffs2_do_fill_super jffs2_do_mount_fs jffs2_build_filesystem jffs2_scan_medium jffs2_scan_eraseblock <--- ERROR jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem <--- free jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem <--- free again -----------------------------------------------------------

An error is returned in jffs2_do_mount_fs(). If the error is returned by jffs2_sum_init(), the jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem() does not need to be executed. If the error is returned by jffs2_build_filesystem(), the jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem() also does not need to be executed again. So move jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem() from 'out_inohash' to 'out_root' to fix this UAF problem.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 4.9.311, 4.14.276, 4.19.238, 5.4.189, 5.10.110, 5.15.33, 5.16.19, 5.17.2, 5.18
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13, Debian 12 5.17.3-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2021-47656

  • linux Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-189.200
  • linux Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-117.132
  • linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-37.39
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 18.04 LTS 4.15.0-1137.148
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1078.84
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1011.14
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 20.04 LTS 5.4.0-1078.84
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1008.12

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2021-47656

Ubuntu security data © Canonical Ltd., from https://github.com/canonical/ubuntu-security-notices via OSV; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. CC BY-SA 4.0

  • kernel-64kb SLES 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP5-ESPOS 5.14.21-150500.55.100.1
  • kernel-syms SLES for SAP 15 SP5, SLES 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP5-LTSS +1 more 5.14.21-150500.55.100.1
  • kernel-source SLES for SAP 15 SP5, SLES 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.5 +2 more 5.14.21-150500.55.100.1
  • kernel-default SLES for SAP 15 SP5, SLES 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.5 +3 more 5.14.21-150500.55.100.1
  • kernel-obs-build SLES for SAP 15 SP5, SLES 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE High Performance Computing 15 SP5-LTSS +1 more 5.14.21-150500.55.100.1
  • kernel-default-base SLES for SAP 15 SP5, SLES 15 SP5-LTSS, SLE Micro 5.5 +2 more 5.14.21-150500.55.100.1.150500.6.47.1
  • kernel-rt SLE Micro 5.4, SLE Micro 5.3 5.14.21-150400.15.115.1
  • kernel-source-rt SLE Micro 5.4, SLE Micro 5.3 5.14.21-150400.15.115.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2025:1241-1SUSE-SU-2025:1183-1SUSE-SU-2025:1176-1SUSE-SU-2025:1027-1

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Vendor advisories

What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.

red hat product security vex CVE-2021-47656 updated cvss 6.7

kernel: jffs2: fix use-after-free in jffs2_clear_xattr_subsystem

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-core, kernel-tools, +29 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 rv, perf, rtla, kernel, bpftool, libperf, +83 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 kernel
    not affected: vulnerable code not present

Red Hat CSAF VEX © Red Hat, Inc., from https://security.access.redhat.com/data/csaf/v2/vex/; changed: reduced to product statuses and remediations. CC BY 4.0 · csaf

CISA SSVC

Exploitation
none
Automatable
no
Technical impact
total
Assessed
last yr.

Exploit prediction

0.26% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 17% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CISA ADP 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
CNA 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Affected products

  • Linux Linux

Classification

Weakness
Technology feeds

References

Sources

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