vulnerability
Red Hat: CVE-2025-21884: kernel: net: better track kernel sockets lifetime
| Severity | CVSS | Published | Added | Modified |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | (AV:L/AC:L/Au:S/C:N/I:N/A:C) | Mar 27, 2025 | Jul 9, 2025 | Jul 10, 2025 |
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
net: better track kernel sockets lifetime
While kernel sockets are dismantled during pernet_operations->exit(),
their freeing can be delayed by any tx packets still held in qdisc
or device queues, due to skb_set_owner_w() prior calls.
This then trigger the following warning from ref_tracker_dir_exit() [1]
To fix this, make sure that kernel sockets own a reference on net->passive.
Add sk_net_refcnt_upgrade() helper, used whenever a kernel socket
is converted to a refcounted one.
[1]
[ 136.263918][ T35] ref_tracker: net notrefcnt@ffff8880638f01e0 has 1/2 users at
[ 136.263918][ T35] sk_alloc+0x2b3/0x370
[ 136.263918][ T35] inet6_create+0x6ce/0x10f0
[ 136.263918][ T35] __sock_create+0x4c0/0xa30
[ 136.263918][ T35] inet_ctl_sock_create+0xc2/0x250
[ 136.263918][ T35] igmp6_net_init+0x39/0x390
[ 136.263918][ T35] ops_init+0x31e/0x590
[ 136.263918][ T35] setup_net+0x287/0x9e0
[ 136.263918][ T35] copy_net_ns+0x33f/0x570
[ 136.263918][ T35] create_new_namespaces+0x425/0x7b0
[ 136.263918][ T35] unshare_nsproxy_namespaces+0x124/0x180
[ 136.263918][ T35] ksys_unshare+0x57d/0xa70
[ 136.263918][ T35] __x64_sys_unshare+0x38/0x40
[ 136.263918][ T35] do_syscall_64+0xf3/0x230
[ 136.263918][ T35] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f
[ 136.263918][ T35]
[ 136.343488][ T35] ref_tracker: net notrefcnt@ffff8880638f01e0 has 1/2 users at
[ 136.343488][ T35] sk_alloc+0x2b3/0x370
[ 136.343488][ T35] inet6_create+0x6ce/0x10f0
[ 136.343488][ T35] __sock_create+0x4c0/0xa30
[ 136.343488][ T35] inet_ctl_sock_create+0xc2/0x250
[ 136.343488][ T35] ndisc_net_init+0xa7/0x2b0
[ 136.343488][ T35] ops_init+0x31e/0x590
[ 136.343488][ T35] setup_net+0x287/0x9e0
[ 136.343488][ T35] copy_net_ns+0x33f/0x570
[ 136.343488][ T35] create_new_namespaces+0x425/0x7b0
[ 136.343488][ T35] unshare_nsproxy_namespaces+0x124/0x180
[ 136.343488][ T35] ksys_unshare+0x57d/0xa70
[ 136.343488][ T35] __x64_sys_unshare+0x38/0x40
[ 136.343488][ T35] do_syscall_64+0xf3/0x230
[ 136.343488][ T35] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f
Solution
References
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