Intel

CVE-2025-37945

Siemens ProductCERT Advisory SSA-019113

mediumEPSS 0.2%

Description

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

net: phy: allow MDIO bus PM ops to start/stop state machine for phylink-controlled PHY

DSA has 2 kinds of drivers:

  1. Those who call dsa_switch_suspend() and dsa_switch_resume() from their device PM ops: qca8k-8xxx, bcm_sf2, microchip ksz
  2. Those who don't: all others. The above methods should be optional.

For type 1, dsa_switch_suspend() calls dsa_user_suspend() -> phylink_stop(), and dsa_switch_resume() calls dsa_user_resume() -> phylink_start(). These seem good candidates for setting mac_managed_pm = true because that is essentially its definition [1], but that does not seem to be the biggest problem for now, and is not what this change focuses on.

Talking strictly about the 2nd category of DSA drivers here (which do not have MAC managed PM, meaning that for their attached PHYs, mdio_bus_phy_suspend() and mdio_bus_phy_resume() should run in full), I have noticed that the following warning from mdio_bus_phy_resume() is triggered:

WARN_ON(phydev->state != PHY_HALTED && phydev->state != PHY_READY &&
	phydev->state != PHY_UP);

because the PHY state machine is running.

It's running as a result of a previous dsa_user_open() -> ... -> phylink_start() -> phy_start() having been initiated by the user.

The previous mdio_bus_phy_suspend() was supposed to have called phy_stop_machine(), but it didn't. So this is why the PHY is in state PHY_NOLINK by the time mdio_bus_phy_resume() runs.

mdio_bus_phy_suspend() did not call phy_stop_machine() because for phylink, the phydev->adjust_link function pointer is NULL. This seems a technicality introduced by commit fddd91016d16 ("phylib: fix PAL state machine restart on resume"). That commit was written before phylink existed, and was intended to avoid crashing with consumer drivers which don't use the PHY state machine - phylink always does, when using a PHY. But phylink itself has historically not been developed with suspend/resume in mind, and apparently not tested too much in that scenario, allowing this bug to exist unnoticed for so long. Plus, prior to the WARN_ON(), it would have likely been invisible.

This issue is not in fact restricted to type 2 DSA drivers (according to the above ad-hoc classification), but can be extrapolated to any MAC driver with phylink and MDIO-bus-managed PHY PM ops. DSA is just where the issue was reported. Assuming mac_managed_pm is set correctly, a quick search indicates the following other drivers might be affected:

$ grep -Zlr PHYLINK_NETDEV drivers/ | xargs -0 grep -L mac_managed_pm drivers/net/ethernet/atheros/ag71xx.c drivers/net/ethernet/microchip/sparx5/sparx5_main.c drivers/net/ethernet/microchip/lan966x/lan966x_main.c drivers/net/ethernet/freescale/dpaa2/dpaa2-mac.c drivers/net/ethernet/freescale/fs_enet/fs_enet-main.c drivers/net/ethernet/freescale/dpaa/dpaa_eth.c drivers/net/ethernet/freescale/ucc_geth.c drivers/net/ethernet/freescale/enetc/enetc_pf_common.c drivers/net/ethernet/marvell/mvpp2/mvpp2_main.c drivers/net/ethernet/marvell/mvneta.c drivers/net/ethernet/marvell/prestera/prestera_main.c drivers/net/ethernet/mediatek/mtk_eth_soc.c drivers/net/ethernet/altera/altera_tse_main.c drivers/net/ethernet/wangxun/txgbe/txgbe_phy.c drivers/net/ethernet/meta/fbnic/fbnic_phylink.c drivers/net/ethernet/tehuti/tn40_phy.c drivers/net/ethernet/mscc/ocelot_net.c

Make the existing conditions dependent on the PHY device having a phydev->phy_link_change() implementation equal to the default phy_link_change() provided by phylib. Otherwise, we implicitly know that the phydev has the phylink-provided phylink_phy_change() callback, and when phylink is used, the PHY state machine always needs to be stopped/ started on the suspend/resume path. The code is structured as such that if phydev->phy_link_change() is absent, it is a matter of time until the kernel will crash - no need to further complicate the test.

Thus, for the situation where the PM is not managed b ---truncated---

Source: DEBIAN_DSASIEMENS_ADVISORYSIEMENS_ADVISORYBSIBSI_CSAFCVELISTV5NVDCVEORGEUVD

Metrics

Severity
medium
Priority score
217.94
KEV status
—
Exploit maturity
no public PoC known
XIEM Effective CVSS
5.5
Source: nvd-v3
CVSS v3
5.5
CVSS v4
—
EPSS percentile
8.7 %
Low — this CVE sits in the lower 10% of all CVEs scored today.
EPSS score
0.2 %
Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.
Published
2021-09-26 00:00 UTC
CWE
—

Affected operating systems

  • linux

    amazon / amazon_linux

  • linux

    ubuntu / awsbionic

  • linux

    ubuntu / awsjammy

  • linux

    ubuntu / awsnoble

  • linux

    ubuntu / awsresolute

  • linux

    ubuntu / awsxenial

  • linux

    ubuntu / aws-6.8jammy

  • linux

    ubuntu / aws-hwexenial

  • linux

    ubuntu / azurejammy

  • linux

    ubuntu / azurenoble

  • linux

    ubuntu / azureresolute

  • linux

    ubuntu / azurexenial

  • linux

    ubuntu / azure-4.15bionic

  • linux

    suse / basesystem_module15

  • linux

    debian / debian_linux11.0

  • linux

    debian / debian_linux12.0

  • linux

    debian / debian_linux13.0

  • linux

    suse / development_tools_module15

  • linux

    redhat / enterprise_linux10.0

  • linux

    redhat / enterprise_linux7.0

  • linux

    redhat / enterprise_linux8.0

  • linux

    redhat / enterprise_linux9.0

  • linux

    redhat / enterprise_linux_aus8.4

  • linux

    redhat / enterprise_linux_aus8.6

Affected products

Products and version ranges extracted from the vendor/CERT advisory. A range like „<4.14.6“ implies the update recommendation „upgrade to 4.14.6 or later“.

  • arista

    cloudvision_agni2024.4.0 – 2025.2.2

  • arista

    cloudvision_portal2024.2.0 – 2026.1.0

  • arista

    velocloud_edge4.5.0 – 6.4.1

  • arista

    velocloud_gateway

  • arista

    velocloud_orchestrator

  • canonical

    ubuntu_linux

  • Citrix Systems

    Hypervisor8.2 CU1 LTSR

  • Citrix Systems

    XenServer8.4

  • Dell

    ECS3.8.1.0-3.8.1.7

  • Dell

    NetWorkerVirtual Edition

  • Dell

    NetWorkervProxy 19.13.0.3

  • Dell

    NetWorkervProxy 19.14

  • Dell

    PowerScale OneFS13.2.3

  • Dell

    PowerScale OneFSOneFS

  • Dell

    Secure Connect GatewayAppliance 5.32.00.18

  • gnupg

    libgcrypt1.11.0 – 1.11.3

  • gnupg

    libgcrypt1.12.0 – 1.12.2

  • gnupg

    libgcrypt1.8.8 – 1.10.4

  • Intel

    ProzessorCore Ultra 5

  • Intel

    ProzessorCore Ultra 7

  • Intel

    ProzessorCore Ultra 9

  • julia

    openssh_jll

  • netapp

    active_iq_unified_manager

  • netapp

    clustered_data_ontap

References & sources

Linked CVEs

Show 406 more CVEs
IDCVE-2025-37945
Siemens ProductCERT Advisory SSA-019113 — CVE-2025-37945 | NEOSEC Intel