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Fencer Intel
high 7.8

CVE-2024-53096 json

mm: resolve faulty mmap_region() error path behaviour

published last yr. modified 3mo ago also EUVD-2024-50512

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 27%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

mm: resolve faulty mmap_region() error path behaviour

The mmap_region() function is somewhat terrifying, with spaghetti-like control flow and numerous means by which issues can arise and incomplete state, memory leaks and other unpleasantness can occur.

A large amount of the complexity arises from trying to handle errors late in the process of mapping a VMA, which forms the basis of recently observed issues with resource leaks and observable inconsistent state.

Taking advantage of previous patches in this series we move a number of checks earlier in the code, simplifying things by moving the core of the logic into a static internal function __mmap_region().

Doing this allows us to perform a number of checks up front before we do any real work, and allows us to unwind the writable unmap check unconditionally as required and to perform a CONFIG_DEBUG_VM_MAPLE_TREE validation unconditionally also.

We move a number of things here:

1. We preallocate memory for the iterator before we call the file-backed memory hook, allowing us to exit early and avoid having to perform complicated and error-prone close/free logic. We carefully free iterator state on both success and error paths.

2. The enclosing mmap_region() function handles the mapping_map_writable() logic early. Previously the logic had the mapping_map_writable() at the point of mapping a newly allocated file-backed VMA, and a matching mapping_unmap_writable() on success and error paths.

We now do this unconditionally if this is a file-backed, shared writable mapping. If a driver changes the flags to eliminate VM_MAYWRITE, however doing so does not invalidate the seal check we just performed, and we in any case always decrement the counter in the wrapper.

We perform a debug assert to ensure a driver does not attempt to do the opposite.

3. We also move arch_validate_flags() up into the mmap_region() function. This is only relevant on arm64 and sparc64, and the check is only meaningful for SPARC with ADI enabled. We explicitly add a warning for this arch if a driver invalidates this check, though the code ought eventually to be fixed to eliminate the need for this.

With all of these measures in place, we no longer need to explicitly close the VMA on error paths, as we place all checks which might fail prior to a call to any driver mmap hook.

This eliminates an entire class of errors, makes the code easier to reason about and more robust.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 5.10.231, 5.15.174, 5.20, 6.1, 6.1.119, 6.6.63, 6.12
  • linux Debian 12 6.1.119-1
  • linux Debian 14, Debian 13 6.12.3-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2024-53096

  • linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-135.146
  • linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-58.60
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1080.87
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1027.29
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1079.88
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1028.30
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1077.83
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1023.27

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2024-53096

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 RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • rv RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • perf RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • rtla RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • libperf RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • kernel-rt RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • kernel-64k RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6
  • kernel-core RHEL 9 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6

red hat advisories RHSA-2025:6966

  • kernel-source Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-24.1
  • kernel-default Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-24.1
  • kernel-kvmsmall Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-24.1
  • kernel-default-base Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-24.1.21.4
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_4 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 1-1.2
  • kernel-rt Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-22.1
  • kernel-source-rt Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-22.1
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0-RT_Update_4 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 1-1.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2025:20164-1SUSE-SU-2025:20247-1SUSE-SU-2025:20163-1SUSE-SU-2025:20246-1SUSE-SU-2024:4387-1SUSE-SU-2024:4318-1

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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-2024-53096 updated cvss 6.1

kernel: mm: resolve faulty mmap_region() error path behaviour

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, python-perf, kernel-kdump, +8 more
    affected: no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux AppStream (v. 9) rv 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, perf 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, rtla 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, python3-perf 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-devel-matched 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-64k-devel-matched 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, +7 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux BaseOS (v. 9) kernel 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-64k 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-tools 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-modules 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-64k-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, +27 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux CodeReady Linux Builder (v. 9) libperf 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-debuginfo-common-s390x 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-debuginfo-common-x86_64 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-debuginfo-common-aarch64 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-debuginfo-common-ppc64le 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6 Red Hat Enterprise Linux Real Time (v. 9) kernel-rt 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-64k 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-modules 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-64k-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-debug-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, +14 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux Real Time for NFV (v. 9) kernel-rt 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-kvm 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-modules 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-debug-kvm 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, kernel-rt-debug-core 5.14.0-570.12.1.el9_6, +6 more
    fixed: vendor fix RHSA-2025:6966
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 perf, kernel, bpftool, kernel-rt, kernel-core, kernel-tools, +29 more
    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

0.34% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 27% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-11).

Exploits and checks

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 7.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/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
NVD 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

Technology feeds

References

Sources

Fencer Intel keeps one entry per vulnerability: the CVE id wins, then GHSA, and records that alias each other are merged, except that two CVEs always keep separate entries. The same data is available as JSON.