Executive brief
A vulnerability was identified in the Linux kernel's SCSI target subsystem, which manages how the system communicates with storage devices. Under specific memory pressure conditions, the system could experience a crash (NULL pointer dereference) when failing to allocate memory for storage commands. This could lead to a local denial-of-service, impacting the availability of systems using affected storage configurations.
Technical details
A vulnerability exists in the Linux kernel SCSI target subsystem within the 'target_cmd_init_cdb' function in 'drivers/target/target_core_transport.c'. When the allocation of 'cmd->t_task_cdb' fails due to memory exhaustion, the pointer remains NULL but is subsequently dereferenced in the error handling path. This results in a NULL pointer dereference and a kernel panic. The fix involves resetting the 't_task_cdb' pointer to a default fixed-size buffer in the event of an allocation failure to ensure safe cleanup. The issue has been patched in multiple stable branches of the Linux kernel.
Affected products
- Linux Linux Kernel 9e95fb805dc0 to 6cac97b12bdab04832e0416d049efcd0d48d303b
- Siemens SIMATIC S7-1500 CPU 1518-4 PN/DP MFP V3.1.6 and later
Timeline
- 2025-11-18: disclosed: Initial patch submission by Andrey Vatoropin
- 2026-01-13: advisory: CVE published
References
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/0260ad551b0815eb788d47f32899fbcd65d6f128
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/0d36db68fdb8a3325386fd9523b67735f944e1f3
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/45fd86b444105c8bd07a763f58635c87e5dc7aea
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/5053eab38a4c4543522d0c320c639c56a8b59908
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6cac97b12bdab04832e0416d049efcd0d48d303b
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8727663ded659aad55eef21e3864ebf5a4796a96
- https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/8edbb9e371af186b4cf40819dab65fafe109df4d