vulnerability
Ubuntu: (Multiple Advisories) (CVE-2025-38537): Linux kernel vulnerabilities
| Severity | CVSS | Published | Added | Modified |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5 | (AV:L/AC:L/Au:S/C:N/I:N/A:C) | Nov 21, 2025 | Nov 25, 2025 | Feb 13, 2026 |
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
net: phy: Don't register LEDs for genphy
If a PHY has no driver, the genphy driver is probed/removed directly in
phy_attach/detach. If the PHY's ofnode has an "leds" subnode, then the
LEDs will be (un)registered when probing/removing the genphy driver.
This could occur if the leds are for a non-generic driver that isn't
loaded for whatever reason. Synchronously removing the PHY device in
phy_detach leads to the following deadlock:
rtnl_lock()
ndo_close()
...
phy_detach()
phy_remove()
phy_leds_unregister()
led_classdev_unregister()
led_trigger_set()
netdev_trigger_deactivate()
unregister_netdevice_notifier()
rtnl_lock()
There is a corresponding deadlock on the open/register side of things
(and that one is reported by lockdep), but it requires a race while this
one is deterministic.
Generic PHYs do not support LEDs anyway, so don't bother registering
them.
Solutions
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