CVE-2025-68788 json
fsnotify: do not generate ACCESS/MODIFY events on child for special files
published 9mo ago modified 21d ago also EUVD-2026-2320
- cvss
- —
- not scored
- cisa kev
- Not listed
- not in CISA's catalog
- epss
- 0.3%
- EPSS 0.3% chance of exploitation in 30 days, percentile 20%
- public exploits
- 0
- none known
Summary
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
fsnotify: do not generate ACCESS/MODIFY events on child for special files
inotify/fanotify do not allow users with no read access to a file to subscribe to events (e.g. IN_ACCESS/IN_MODIFY), but they do allow the same user to subscribe for watching events on children when the user has access to the parent directory (e.g. /dev).
Users with no read access to a file but with read access to its parent directory can still stat the file and see if it was accessed/modified via atime/mtime change.
The same is not true for special files (e.g. /dev/null). Users will not generally observe atime/mtime changes when other users read/write to special files, only when someone sets atime/mtime via utimensat().
Align fsnotify events with this stat behavior and do not generate ACCESS/MODIFY events to parent watchers on read/write of special files. The events are still generated to parent watchers on utimensat(). This closes some side-channels that could be possibly used for information exfiltration [1].
[1] https://snee.la/pdf/pubs/file-notification-attacks.pdf
Patch / fix
- Linux Linux 5.10.248, 5.15.198, 6.1.160, 6.6.120, 6.12.64, 6.18.3, 6.19
- linux Debian 12 6.1.162-1
- linux Debian 13 6.12.69-1
- linux Debian 14 6.18.3-1
debian advisories DEBIAN-CVE-2025-68788
- linux Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-173.183
- linux Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-110.110
- linux Ubuntu 25.10 6.17.0-22.22
- linux-aws Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1103.110
- linux-aws Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1052.55
- linux-aws Ubuntu 25.10 6.17.0-1012.12
- linux-gcp Ubuntu 22.04 LTS 5.15.0-1103.112
- linux-gcp Ubuntu 24.04 LTS 6.8.0-1054.57
ubuntu advisories UBUNTU-CVE-2025-68788
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-rt Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-40.1
- kernel-source-rt Linux Micro 6.1, Linux Micro 6.0 6.4.0-40.1
- kernel-rt Linux Micro 6.2 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-64kb SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-source SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-default SLES 16.0, SLE High Availability Extension 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2 +1 more 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-default-base SLES 16.0, Linux Micro 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1.160000.2.7
- kernel-syms SLES 16.0, Linux Micro Extras 6.2, SLES for SAP applications 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
suse advisories SUSE-SU-2026:20845-1SUSE-SU-2026:20876-1SUSE-SU-2026:20555-1SUSE-SU-2026:20599-1SUSE-SU-2026:20615-1SUSE-SU-2026:20570-1
- kernel-rt openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- dtb-aarch64 openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-64kb openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-syms openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-azure openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-obs-qa openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-source openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
- kernel-default openSUSE Leap 16.0 6.12.0-160000.26.1
opensuse advisories openSUSE-SU-2026:20287-1
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/df2711544b050aba703e6da418c53c7dc5d443ca commit
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/859bdf438f01d9aa7f84b09c1202d548c7cad9e8 commit
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/6a7d7d96eeeab7af2bd01afbb3d9878a11a13d91 commit
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/e0643d46759db8b84c0504a676043e5e341b6c81 commit
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/82f7416bcbd951549e758d15fc1a96a5afc2e900 commit
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/7a93edb23bcf07a3aaf8b598edfc2faa8fbcc0b6 commit
- git.kernel.org/stable/c/635bc4def026a24e071436f4f356ea08c0eed6ff commit
Is CVE-2025-68788 in your stack? Fencer shows which of your repositories are affected as soon as an advisory lands, and opens the fix as a pull request.
Check with FencerVendor advisories
What the vendors themselves say about their products: affected, fixed or not affected, and what to do.
red hat product security vex CVE-2025-68788 updated cvss 2.5
kernel: fsnotify: do not generate ACCESS/MODIFY events on child for special files
-
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 perf, kernel, python-perf, kernel-kdump, kernel-firmware, kernel-bootwrapper, +1 moreaffected: 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 kernelaffected: no fix available
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 ICSA-26-295-11 updated cvss 4.7
Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518(F)-4 PN/DP MFP
-
Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4AX00-1AB0) >= 3.1.7 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4AX00-1AC0) >= 3.1.7 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4FX00-1AB0) >= 3.1.7 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4FX00-1AC0) >= 3.1.7 Siemens SIPLUS S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6AG1518-4AX00-4AC0) >= 3.1.7affected: mitigation, no fix available
Facts from CISA's republication of the vendor's own advisory (CSAF); the linked advisory is the authoritative source. CISA notification · csaf
cisa ICSA-26-209-04 updated cvss 4.7
Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518(F)-4 PN/DP MFP
-
Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4AX00-1AB0) >= 3.1.6 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4AX00-1AC0) >= 3.1.6 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4FX00-1AB0) >= 3.1.6 Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP (6ES7518-4FX00-1AC0) >= 3.1.6 Siemens SIPLUS S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP (6AG1518-4AX00-4AC0) >= 3.1.6affected: mitigation, no fix available
Facts from CISA's republication of the vendor's own advisory (CSAF); the linked advisory is the authoritative source. CISA notification · csaf
CISA SSVC
- Exploitation
- none
- Automatable
- no
- Technical impact
- partial
- Assessed
- 4mo ago
Exploit prediction
0.28% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 20% of all scored CVEs (FIRST EPSS, 2026-11-09).
Affected products
- Linux Linux
- Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP
- Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518F-4 PN/DP MFP
- Siemens SIPLUS S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP
Classification
- Weakness
-
- CWE-200 Exposure of Sensitive Information to an Unauthorized Actor
- Technology feeds
References
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/df2711544b050aba703e6da418c53c7dc5d443ca
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/859bdf438f01d9aa7f84b09c1202d548c7cad9e8
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/6a7d7d96eeeab7af2bd01afbb3d9878a11a13d91
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/e0643d46759db8b84c0504a676043e5e341b6c81
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/82f7416bcbd951549e758d15fc1a96a5afc2e900
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/7a93edb23bcf07a3aaf8b598edfc2faa8fbcc0b6
- git.kernel.org /stable/c/635bc4def026a24e071436f4f356ea08c0eed6ff
- cert-portal.siemens.com /productcert/html/ssa-019113.html
- cert-portal.siemens.com /productcert/html/ssa-457936.html
Sources
- CVE List CVE-2025-68788
- NVD CVE-2025-68788
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