CVE-2025-38614

Source
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-38614
Import Source
https://storage.googleapis.com/osv-test-cve-osv-conversion/osv-output/CVE-2025-38614.json
JSON Data
https://api.test.osv.dev/v1/vulns/CVE-2025-38614
Downstream
Related
Published
2025-08-19T17:03:56.348Z
Modified
2025-11-28T02:34:01.299039Z
Summary
eventpoll: Fix semi-unbounded recursion
Details

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

eventpoll: Fix semi-unbounded recursion

Ensure that epoll instances can never form a graph deeper than EPMAXNESTS+1 links.

Currently, eploopcheck_proc() ensures that the graph is loop-free and does some recursion depth checks, but those recursion depth checks don't limit the depth of the resulting tree for two reasons:

  • They don't look upwards in the tree.
  • If there are multiple downwards paths of different lengths, only one of the paths is actually considered for the depth check since commit 28d82dc1c4ed ("epoll: limit paths").

Essentially, the current recursion depth check in eploopcheck_proc() just serves to prevent it from recursing too deeply while checking for loops.

A more thorough check is done in reversepathcheck() after the new graph edge has already been created; this checks, among other things, that no paths going upwards from any non-epoll file with a length of more than 5 edges exist. However, this check does not apply to non-epoll files.

As a result, it is possible to recurse to a depth of at least roughly 500, tested on v6.15. (I am unsure if deeper recursion is possible; and this may have changed with commit 8c44dac8add7 ("eventpoll: Fix priority inversion problem").)

To fix it:

  1. In eploopcheck_proc(), note the subtree depth of each visited node, and use subtree depths for the total depth calculation even when a subtree has already been visited.
  2. Add epgetupwardsdepthproc() for similarly determining the maximum depth of an upwards walk.
  3. In eploopcheck(), use these values to limit the total path length between epoll nodes to EPMAXNESTS edges.
Database specific
{
    "cna_assigner": "Linux",
    "osv_generated_from": "https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/tree/main/cves/2025/38xxx/CVE-2025-38614.json"
}
References

Affected packages

Git / git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git

Affected ranges

Type
GIT
Repo
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git
Events
Introduced
22bacca48a1755f79b7e0f192ddb9fbb7fc6e64e
Fixed
71379495ab70eaba19224bd71b5b9b399eb85e04
Fixed
1b13b033062824495554e836a1ff5f85ccf6b039
Fixed
2a0c0c974bea9619c6f41794775ae4b97530e0e6
Fixed
7a2125962c42d5336ca0495a9ce4cb38a63e9161
Fixed
ea5f97dbdcb1651581a22bd10afd2f0dd9dc11d6
Fixed
3542c90797bc3ab83ebab54b737d751cf3682036
Fixed
f2e467a48287c868818085aa35389a224d226732
Type
GIT
Repo
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/stable/linux.git
Events
Introduced
0 Unknown introduced commit / All previous commits are affected
Last affected
8216e1a0d47cae06a75c42346f19dffe14e42d57
Last affected
28a92748aa4bc57d35e7b079498b0ac2e7610a37
Last affected
7eebcd4792c5a341559aed327b6afecbb1c46402
Last affected
0eccd188cfeaf857a26f2d72941d27d298cf6a54
Last affected
a72affdbb09f3f24f64ffcbbdf62c2e57c58f379

Linux / Kernel

Package

Name
Kernel

Affected ranges

Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
2.6.38
Fixed
5.15.190
Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
5.16.0
Fixed
6.1.149
Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
6.2.0
Fixed
6.6.103
Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
6.7.0
Fixed
6.12.43
Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
6.13.0
Fixed
6.15.11
Type
ECOSYSTEM
Events
Introduced
6.16.0
Fixed
6.16.1