HighCVE-2025-21753

    Linux Kernel: Use-After-Free (CVE-2025-21753)

    Published Last modified Sources: Siemens ProductCERT, BSI, SUSE, Debian LTS, Msrc Update Guide, EUVD, CVE.org

    What is affected, what to do

    In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: btrfs: fix use-after-free when attempting to join an aborted transaction When we are trying to join the current transaction and if it's aborted, we read its 'aborted' field after unlocking fs_info->trans_lock and without holding any extra reference count on it. This means that a concurrent task that is aborting the transaction may free the transaction before we read its 'aborted' field, leading to a use-after-free.

    Update Linux Kernel to version 5.4.291, Linux Kernel to version 5.10.235, Linux Kernel to version 5.15.179.

    Affected
    • Linux Kernel lt 3.4..5.4.291
    • Linux Kernel lt 5.5..5.10.235
    • Linux Kernel lt 5.11..5.15.179
    • Linux Kernel lt 5.16..6.1.129
    • Linux Kernel lt 6.2..6.6.78
    • Linux Kernel lt 6.7..6.12.14
    • Linux Kernel lt 6.13..6.13.3
    Fixed in
    • Linux Kernel 5.4.291
    • Linux Kernel 5.10.235
    • Linux Kernel 5.15.179
    • Linux Kernel 6.1.129
    • Linux Kernel 6.6.78
    • Linux Kernel 6.12.14
    • Linux Kernel 6.13.3
    • Linux Kernel 6.14

    Not sure whether and how you are affected? Ask a question about this vulnerability

    Metrics

    7.8

    Priority

    XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.

    Source: NVD, CVSS v3

    7.8

    CVSS v3

    Severity High on the scale from 0 to 10.

    Source: Siemens ProductCERT, BSI, SUSE, Debian LTS, Msrc Update Guide, EUVD, CVE.org

    0.3 %

    EPSS score

    Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.

    Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 17.7

    Show all metrics
    Severity
    High
    Priority (0–325)

    The priority score is a consolidated metric that condenses several individual signals into a single, action-guiding ranking: technical severity (CVSS), exploitation likelihood (EPSS), known-exploited status (KEV) and the context of the affected asset. The aim is to answer the only truly important question in vulnerability management: what first?

    Read in glossary
    49.51 Methodology
    Exploit maturity

    An exploit is code or a technique that specifically uses a concrete vulnerability to force unintended behaviour — such as executing code or escalating privileges. It is the tool that turns a theoretical flaw into a practical attack.

    Read in glossary
    no public PoC known
    XIEM Effective CVSS

    XIEM® is the tiered managed-security operating model from NEOSEC and a registered trademark of NEOSEC GmbH. It extends classic SIEM — the central collection, normalisation and correlation of security-relevant events — with endpoint forensics, network visibility and deception technology, and consolidates them into three building tiers: Sentry, Orchestrate and Command.

    Read in glossary
    7.8 Methodology
    CVSS v3

    CVSS is the globally established, open standard for assessing the technical severity of a vulnerability on a scale from 0 to 10. It describes how easily a flaw can be exploited and what damage it can cause — but not how likely its actual exploitation is. CVSS and the complementary EPSS deliberately answer different questions.

    Read in glossary
    7.8
    EPSS score

    The EPSS score is the absolute model output for an individual vulnerability: the estimated probability of real-world exploitation within the next 30 days, expressed as a value between 0 and 1 (i.e. 0 % to 100 %). A score of 0.42 means „the model estimates a 42 % chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days“.

    Read in glossary
    0.3 %
    Low — model estimates < 1% exploitation likelihood.
    EPSS percentile

    The EPSS percentile is the relative position of a vulnerability within all EPSS-scored CVEs, expressed as a value between 0 and 1. A percentile of 0.90 means „this CVE has a higher EPSS score than 90 % of all other scored CVEs“. Unlike the EPSS score, it is not a probability — but a positioning within a ranking.

    Read in glossary
    17.7
    Elevated — this CVE ranks above at least 10% of all CVEs scored today.
    KEV status

    The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching.

    Read in glossary
    —
    Published
    CISA assessment (SSVC)
    Exploitation: none known · not automatable · Technical impact: total
    Source: CISA Vulnrichment, as of 27 February 2025
    CWE

    CWE is a catalogue of typical weakness types in software and hardware — such as flawed input validation, unsafe memory handling or poor authentication. Where a CVE names a concrete vulnerability in a concrete product, a CWE describes the underlying class of defect.

    Read in glossary
    CWE-416

    Detection rules

    No NEOSEC detection rule is available for this vulnerability yet.

    Classification under NIS2 and CRA

    Rule-based classification from exploitation status and severity. It does not replace a case-by-case assessment.

    NIS2

    NIS2 is EU Directive (EU) 2022/2555 to raise the level of cybersecurity across the Union. It substantially broadens obligations compared with the first NIS directive: more sectors, mandatory risk management, staged reporting duties and personal accountability of senior management.

    Read in glossary
    High technical severity: assess and remediate the vulnerability in vulnerability handling under Art. 21(2)(e) NIS2 and document the decision.
    CRA

    The CRA is EU Regulation (EU) 2024/2847 setting horizontal cybersecurity requirements for „products with digital elements“ — from industrial controllers and software to connected consumer devices. For the first time manufacturers must ensure security across the entire product lifecycle, handle vulnerabilities and provide security updates.

    Read in glossary
    From 11.12.2027, Annex I Part II CRA requires manufacturers of affected products with digital elements to handle vulnerabilities without delay and provide security updates.
    ISO/IEC 27001

    ISO/IEC 27001 is the internationally leading standard for an information security management system (ISMS). It describes a risk-based, process-oriented framework to systematically plan, implement, review and improve information security.

    Read in glossary
    Control A.8.8, management of technical vulnerabilities: assess relevance to your systems, plan remediation and keep evidence.

    Description

    In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: btrfs: fix use-after-free when attempting to join an aborted transaction When we are trying to join the current transaction and if it's aborted, we read its 'aborted' field after unlocking fs_info->trans_lock and without holding any extra reference count on it. This means that a concurrent task that is aborting the transaction may free the transaction before we read its 'aborted' field, leading to a use-after-free. Fix this by reading the 'aborted' field while holding fs_info->trans_lock since any freeing task must first acquire that lock and set fs_info->running_transaction to NULL before freeing the transaction. This was reported by syzbot and Dmitry with the following stack traces from KASAN: ================================================================== BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in join_transaction+0xd9b/0xda0 fs/btrfs/transaction.c:278 Read of size 4 at addr ffff888011839024 by task kworker/u4:9/1128 CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 1128 Comm: kworker/u4:9 Not tainted 6.13.0-rc7-syzkaller-00019-gc45323b7560e #0 Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.16.3-debian-1.16.3-2~bpo12+1 04/01/2014 Workqueue: events_unbound btrfs_async_reclaim_data_space Call Trace: <TASK> __dump_stack lib/dump_stack.c:94 [inline] dump_stack_lvl+0x241/0x360 lib/dump_stack.c:120 print_address_description mm/kasan/report.c:378 [inline] print_report+0x169/0x550 mm/kasan/report.c:489 kasan_report+0x143/0x180 mm/kasan/report.c:602 join_transaction+0xd9b/0xda0 fs/btrfs/transaction.c:278 start_transaction+0xaf8/0x1670 fs/btrfs/transaction.c:697 flush_space+0x448/0xcf0 fs/btrfs/space-info.c:803 btrfs_async_reclaim_data_space+0x159/0x510 fs/btrfs/space-info.c:1321 process_one_work kernel/workqueue.c:3236 [inline] process_scheduled_works+0xa66/0x1840 kernel/workqueue.c:3317 worker_thread+0x870/0xd30 kernel/workqueue.c:3398 kthread+0x2f0/0x390 kernel/kthread.c:389 ret_from_fork+0x4b/0x80 arch/x86/kernel/process.c:147 ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:244 </TASK> Allocated by task 5315: kasan_save_stack mm/kasan/common.c:47 [inline] kasan_save_track+0x3f/0x80 mm/kasan/common.c:68 poison_kmalloc_redzone mm/kasan/common.c:377 [inline] __kasan_kmalloc+0x98/0xb0 mm/kasan/common.c:394 kasan_kmalloc include/linux/kasan.h:260 [inline] __kmalloc_cache_noprof+0x243/0x390 mm/slub.c:4329 kmalloc_noprof include/linux/slab.h:901 [inline] join_transaction+0x144/0xda0 fs/btrfs/transaction.c:308 start_transaction+0xaf8/0x1670 fs/btrfs/transaction.c:697 btrfs_create_common+0x1b2/0x2e0 fs/btrfs/inode.c:6572 lookup_open fs/namei.c:3649 [inline] open_last_lookups fs/namei.c:3748 [inline] path_openat+0x1c03/0x3590 fs/namei.c:3984 do_filp_open+0x27f/0x4e0 fs/namei.c:4014 do_sys_openat2+0x13e/0x1d0 fs/open.c:1402 do_sys_open fs/open.c:1417 [inline] __do_sys_creat fs/open.c:1495 [inline] __se_sys_creat fs/open.c:1489 [inline] __x64_sys_creat+0x123/0x170 fs/open.c:1489 do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:52 [inline] do_syscall_64+0xf3/0x230 arch/x86/entry/common.c:83 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f Freed by task 5336: kasan_save_stack mm/kasan/common.c:47 [inline] kasan_save_track+0x3f/0x80 mm/kasan/common.c:68 kasan_save_free_info+0x40/0x50 mm/kasan/generic.c:582 poison_slab_object mm/kasan/common.c:247 [inline] __kasan_slab_free+0x59/0x70 mm/kasan/common.c:264 kasan_slab_free include/linux/kasan.h:233 [inline] slab_free_hook mm/slub.c:2353 [inline] slab_free mm/slub.c:4613 [inline] kfree+0x196/0x430 mm/slub.c:4761 cleanup_transaction fs/btrfs/transaction.c:2063 [inline] btrfs_commit_transaction+0x2c97/0x3720 fs/btrfs/transaction.c:2598 insert_balance_item+0x1284/0x20b0 fs/btrfs/volumes.c:3757 btrfs_balance+0x992/ ---truncated---

    Source: siemens_advisory, BSI CSAF, BSI WID Portal, suse_csaf, Debian LTS Advisories, Microsoft Security Update Guide, ENISA EUVD, cvelistv5, NVD (NIST), CVE.org (MITRE)

    Affected products

    The following versions are affected. Older releases of the same product line are also vulnerable unless stated otherwise.

    Affected products
    Affected versionsFixed in
    LinuxLinux
    • 5.5 – < 5.10.235
    • —
    • 5.16 – < 6.1.129
    • 5.11 – < 5.15.179
    • 6.7 – < 6.12.14
    • 6.2 – < 6.6.78
    • 6.13 – < 6.13.3
    • 3.4 – < 5.4.291
    • 5.10.235
    • 6.14
    • 6.1.129
    • 5.15.179
    • 6.12.14
    • 6.6.78
    • 6.13.3
    • 5.4.291
    DellSecure Connect Gateway
    • < 5.30.0.14
    • 5.30.0.14
    SiemensSIMATIC S7
    • 1500 TM MFP V1.1.1 GNU/Linux subsystem
    • —

    Vendors and products

    Affected operating systems

    Affected operating systems
    Linuxdebianlinuxbullseye
    Linuxdebianlinux-6.1bullseye
    Linuxlinuxlinux_kernel6.14
    Linuxlinuxlinux_kernel—

    Weakness classes (CWE)

    • CWE-416Use After Free

      Variant

      The product reuses or references memory after it has been freed. At some point afterward, the memory may be allocated again and saved in another pointer, while the original pointer references a location somewhere within the new allocation. Any operations using the original pointer are no longer valid because the memory "belongs" to the code that operates on the new pointer.

      Entry at MITRE CWE-416

    References & sources

    Changes to this CVE

    Who changed this CVE and when: NVD (analysis, affected products, CVSS), the CVE publisher (CNA) and additional providers such as CISA (ADP).

    1. Record modifiedLinux

      CVSS V3.1: AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

      Show 25 original changes
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      CVSSadded
      —
      AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6ba4663ada6c6315af23a6669d386146634808ec
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/7e954b6bb95d67ae4d1a20e9cfd83c182cf929bc
      Referenceadded
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      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/86d71a026a7f63da905db9add845c8ee88801eca
      Referenceadded
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      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8f5cff471039caa2b088060c074c2bf2081bcb01
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      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c7a53757717e68af94a56929d57f1e6daff220ec
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      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/ce628048390dad80320d5a1f74de6ca1e1be91e7
      Referenceadded
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      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/cee55b1219568c80bf0d5dc55066e4a859baf753
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/e2f0943cf37305dbdeaf9846e3c941451bcdef63
      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6ba4663ada6c6315af23a6669d386146634808ec
      —
      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/7e954b6bb95d67ae4d1a20e9cfd83c182cf929bc
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      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/86d71a026a7f63da905db9add845c8ee88801eca
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      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8f5cff471039caa2b088060c074c2bf2081bcb01
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      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c7a53757717e68af94a56929d57f1e6daff220ec
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      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/ce628048390dad80320d5a1f74de6ca1e1be91e7
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      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/cee55b1219568c80bf0d5dc55066e4a859baf753
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      Referenceremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/e2f0943cf37305dbdeaf9846e3c941451bcdef63
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6ba4663ada6c6315af23a6669d386146634808ec Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/7e954b6bb95d67ae4d1a20e9cfd83c182cf929bc Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/86d71a026a7f63da905db9add845c8ee88801eca Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8f5cff471039caa2b088060c074c2bf2081bcb01 Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/c7a53757717e68af94a56929d57f1e6daff220ec Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/ce628048390dad80320d5a1f74de6ca1e1be91e7 Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/cee55b1219568c80bf0d5dc55066e4a859baf753 Types: Patch
      —
      Reference typeremoved
      https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/e2f0943cf37305dbdeaf9846e3c941451bcdef63 Types: Patch
      —

      Source identifier: 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67

    2. Record modifiedCVE Program

      Show 4 original changes
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/03/msg00028.html
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/05/msg00030.html
      Referenceremoved
      https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/03/msg00028.html
      —
      Referenceremoved
      https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/05/msg00030.html
      —

      Source identifier: af854a3a-2127-422b-91ae-364da2661108

    3. Record modifiedSiemens ADP

      Show 4 original changes
      Individual changes of this event as published by NVD
      TypeActionBeforeAfter
      Affected versions (publisher)added
      —
      Affected value modified. <a href="https://github.com/CVEProject/cvelistV5/blob/main/cves/2025/21xxx/CVE-2025-21753.json">CVE-2025-21753</a>
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://cert-portal.siemens.com/productcert/html/ssa-265688.html
      Referenceadded
      —
      https://cert-portal.siemens.com/productcert/html/ssa-784472.html
      Referenceremoved
      https://cert-portal.siemens.com/productcert/html/ssa-265688.html
      —

      Source identifier: 0b142b55-0307-4c5a-b3c9-f314f3fb7c5e

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