CVE-2025-38389

Published Jul 25, 2025

Last updated 10 months ago

Overview

Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: drm/i915/gt: Fix timeline left held on VMA alloc error The following error has been reported sporadically by CI when a test unbinds the i915 driver on a ring submission platform: <4> [239.330153] ------------[ cut here ]------------ <4> [239.330166] i915 0000:00:02.0: [drm] drm_WARN_ON(dev_priv->mm.shrink_count) <4> [239.330196] WARNING: CPU: 1 PID: 18570 at drivers/gpu/drm/i915/i915_gem.c:1309 i915_gem_cleanup_early+0x13e/0x150 [i915] ... <4> [239.330640] RIP: 0010:i915_gem_cleanup_early+0x13e/0x150 [i915] ... <4> [239.330942] Call Trace: <4> [239.330944] <TASK> <4> [239.330949] i915_driver_late_release+0x2b/0xa0 [i915] <4> [239.331202] i915_driver_release+0x86/0xa0 [i915] <4> [239.331482] devm_drm_dev_init_release+0x61/0x90 <4> [239.331494] devm_action_release+0x15/0x30 <4> [239.331504] release_nodes+0x3d/0x120 <4> [239.331517] devres_release_all+0x96/0xd0 <4> [239.331533] device_unbind_cleanup+0x12/0x80 <4> [239.331543] device_release_driver_internal+0x23a/0x280 <4> [239.331550] ? bus_find_device+0xa5/0xe0 <4> [239.331563] device_driver_detach+0x14/0x20 ... <4> [357.719679] ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]--- If the test also unloads the i915 module then that's followed with: <3> [357.787478] ============================================================================= <3> [357.788006] BUG i915_vma (Tainted: G U W N ): Objects remaining on __kmem_cache_shutdown() <3> [357.788031] ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- <3> [357.788204] Object 0xffff888109e7f480 @offset=29824 <3> [357.788670] Allocated in i915_vma_instance+0xee/0xc10 [i915] age=292729 cpu=4 pid=2244 <4> [357.788994] i915_vma_instance+0xee/0xc10 [i915] <4> [357.789290] init_status_page+0x7b/0x420 [i915] <4> [357.789532] intel_engines_init+0x1d8/0x980 [i915] <4> [357.789772] intel_gt_init+0x175/0x450 [i915] <4> [357.790014] i915_gem_init+0x113/0x340 [i915] <4> [357.790281] i915_driver_probe+0x847/0xed0 [i915] <4> [357.790504] i915_pci_probe+0xe6/0x220 [i915] ... Closer analysis of CI results history has revealed a dependency of the error on a few IGT tests, namely: - igt@api_intel_allocator@fork-simple-stress-signal, - igt@api_intel_allocator@two-level-inception-interruptible, - igt@gem_linear_blits@interruptible, - igt@prime_mmap_coherency@ioctl-errors, which invisibly trigger the issue, then exhibited with first driver unbind attempt. All of the above tests perform actions which are actively interrupted with signals. Further debugging has allowed to narrow that scope down to DRM_IOCTL_I915_GEM_EXECBUFFER2, and ring_context_alloc(), specific to ring submission, in particular. If successful then that function, or its execlists or GuC submission equivalent, is supposed to be called only once per GEM context engine, followed by raise of a flag that prevents the function from being called again. The function is expected to unwind its internal errors itself, so it may be safely called once more after it returns an error. In case of ring submission, the function first gets a reference to the engine's legacy timeline and then allocates a VMA. If the VMA allocation fails, e.g. when i915_vma_instance() called from inside is interrupted with a signal, then ring_context_alloc() fails, leaving the timeline held referenced. On next I915_GEM_EXECBUFFER2 IOCTL, another reference to the timeline is got, and only that last one is put on successful completion. As a consequence, the legacy timeline, with its underlying engine status page's VMA object, is still held and not released on driver unbind. Get the legacy timeline only after successful allocation of the context engine's VMA. v2: Add a note on other submission methods (Krzysztof Karas): Both execlists and GuC submission use lrc_alloc() which seems free from a similar issue. (cherry picked from commit cc43422b3cc79eacff4c5a8ba0d224688ca9dd4f)
Source
416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
NVD status
Analyzed
Products
linux_kernel, debian_linux

Risk scores

CVSS 3.1

Type
Primary
Base score
7.8
Impact score
5.9
Exploitability score
1.8
Vector string
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Severity
HIGH

Weaknesses

nvd@nist.gov
NVD-CWE-noinfo

Social media

Hype score
Not currently trending

Configurations

  1. In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: cgroup: Avoid iteration of dying tasks with zero refcount The commit 260fbcb92bbea ("cgroup: Move dying_tasks cleanup from cgroup_task_release() to cgroup_task_free()") extended the lifetime of tasks on the dying_tasks list. The iterators have provision to go through dying_tasks because of dying threadgroup leaders or explicit CSS_TASK_ITER_WITH_DEAD, however, it was expected that such tasks can obtain a new reference (that is possible before cgroup_task_release()/put_task_struct_rcu_user()). The tasks after cgroup_task_release() and before cgroup_task_free() are subject to race when they may or may not have ->usage count > 0. The race window is between css_task_iter_next() invocations when css_set_lock is released and we may arrive at a new ->task_pos. The iterator should not attempt to resurrect tasks whose ->usage count dropped to zero. (When that happens, __put_task_struct_rcu_cb() is already imminent and the returned task_struct would could be used after free.) As for the fix, we cannot simply check the signal->live count of a task on the dying list because that won't distinguish regular zombies waiting to be reaped from RCU remnant tasks that are going to be free'd. Therefore add an extra check to rule out ->usage==0 tasks from any iteration. The repeat: loop in css_task_iter_advance() doesn't consider ->usage count, so add a new loop to css_task_iter_next() to skip de-used tasks on the dying_list. Rough illustration of the possible race R (reader of cgroup.procs) T (thread) L (group leader) --------------------------------- -------------------------------- -------------------------------- L exits, signal->live > 0 cgroup_task_dead(L) css_set_skip_task_iters() // skips only cset->tasks list_add_tail(&L->cg_list, &cset->dying_tasks) css_task_iter_next() take css_set_lock css_task_iter_advance() leader && signal->live != 0 => it->task_pos = &L->cg_list release css_set_lock T exits --signal->live == 0 cgroup_task_dead(T) // css_set_lock release_task(T) cgroup_task_release(T) release_task(L) // zap_leader cgroup_task_release(L) put_task_struct_rcu_user(L) ...RCU... put_task_struct(L) L->usage = 0 /* L still on dying_tasks */ ...RCU... __put_task_struct(L) css_task_iter_next() // another iteration take css_set_lock it->task_pos = &L->cg_list get_task_struct(L) => addition on 0 drop css_set_lock cgroup_task_free(L) css_set_skip_task_iters() // dying skip comes too late free_task(L) cgroup_procs_show() task_pid_vnr(L)•CVE-2026-98163