Executive brief
The Linux kernel's AMD graphics driver contains a memory leak in the display clock source creation function. When the function encounters an error condition and returns NULL, allocated memory for a clock source object is not freed, causing memory to accumulate over time. This can lead to gradual degradation of system performance and stability, particularly in systems that frequently encounter the error condition.
Technical details
The vulnerability is a memory leak in the dcn30_clock_source_create() function within the AMD display driver (drivers/gpu/drm/amd/display/dc/dcn314/dcn314_resource.c). When the function encounters an error and reaches the final "return NULL" statement, the clk_src structure allocated earlier is not freed via kfree(). The fix adds a kfree(clk_src) call before the return statement. This is a local vulnerability affecting the kernel driver code; no network vector is present. The impact is kernel memory exhaustion over time, potentially causing denial of service. The patch was merged in August 2022 and backported to stable kernel branches.
Affected products
- Linux Linux kernel various (patched in 2022-08-25)
Timeline
- 2025-10-04: disclosed
- 2022-08-25: patched: Upstream fix merged; backported to stable branches