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critical 9.8

CVE-2025-38488 in the critical feed json

smb: client: fix use-after-free in crypt_message when using async crypto

published last yr. modified 3mo ago also EUVD-2025-22875

cvss
9.8
version 3.1, CNA
cisa kev
Not listed
not in CISA's catalog
epss
0.8%
EPSS 0.8% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 55%
public exploits
0
none known

Summary

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

smb: client: fix use-after-free in crypt_message when using async crypto

The CVE-2024-50047 fix removed asynchronous crypto handling from crypt_message(), assuming all crypto operations are synchronous. However, when hardware crypto accelerators are used, this can cause use-after-free crashes:

crypt_message() // Allocate the creq buffer containing the req creq = smb2_get_aead_req(..., &req);

// Async encryption returns -EINPROGRESS immediately rc = enc ? crypto_aead_encrypt(req) : crypto_aead_decrypt(req);

// Free creq while async operation is still in progress kvfree_sensitive(creq, ...);

Hardware crypto modules often implement async AEAD operations for performance. When crypto_aead_encrypt/decrypt() returns -EINPROGRESS, the operation completes asynchronously. Without crypto_wait_req(), the function immediately frees the request buffer, leading to crashes when the driver later accesses the freed memory.

This results in a use-after-free condition when the hardware crypto driver later accesses the freed request structure, leading to kernel crashes with NULL pointer dereferences.

The issue occurs because crypto_alloc_aead() with mask=0 doesn't guarantee synchronous operation. Even without CRYPTO_ALG_ASYNC in the mask, async implementations can be selected.

Fix by restoring the async crypto handling: - DECLARE_CRYPTO_WAIT(wait) for completion tracking - aead_request_set_callback() for async completion notification - crypto_wait_req() to wait for operation completion

This ensures the request buffer isn't freed until the crypto operation completes, whether synchronous or asynchronous, while preserving the CVE-2024-50047 fix.

Patch / fix

  • Linux Linux 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.147, 6.6.100, 6.12, 6.12.40, 6.15.8, 6.16
  • linux Debian 12 6.1.147-1
  • linux Debian 13 6.12.41-1
  • linux Debian 14 6.16.3-1

debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2025-38488

  • linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-163.173
  • linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-100.100
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1097.104
  • linux-aws Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1046.49
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1097.106
  • linux-gcp Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1047.50
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1093.99
  • linux-gke Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1043.48

ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2025-38488

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-livepatch-SLE16_Update_0 SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 8-160000.4.3
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_11 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6-1.1
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_9 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 13-1.2
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_10 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 7-1.1
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_7 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 14-1.2
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_8 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 13-1.2
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_5 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 17-1.2
  • kernel-livepatch-MICRO-6-0_Update_6 Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 15-3.1

suse advisories SUSE-SU-2026:1132-1SUSE-SU-2026:1125-1SUSE-SU-2026:1096-1SUSE-SU-2026:1101-1SUSE-SU-2026:1089-1SUSE-SU-2026:1088-1

  • kernel-rt openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • dtb-aarch64 openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • kernel-64kb openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • kernel-syms openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • kernel-obs-qa openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • kernel-source openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • kernel-default openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1
  • kernel-kvmsmall openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.6.1

opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2025:20081-1

  • kernel CBL-Mariner 2.0 5.15.200.1-1

azure linux advisories AZL-73458

Azure Linux vulnerability data, Copyright (c) Microsoft Corporation, from https://github.com/microsoft/AzureLinuxVulnerabilityData via OSV, under the MIT licence; changed: normalised to fixed package versions per release. MIT

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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-2025-38488 updated cvss 5.5

kernel: Linux kernel: Denial of Service in SMB client due to use-after-free in asynchronous crypto handling

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 rv, perf, rtla, kernel, bpftool, libperf, +83 more Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10 kernel
    affected: workaround, no fix planned “Out of support scope”
  • 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 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

Exploit prediction

0.77% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 55% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).

CVSS scores

assigned by version score vector
CNA 3.1 9.8 CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/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

Weakness
Technology feeds

References

Sources

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