CVE-2025-38102

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

VMCI: fix race between vmci_host_setup_notify and vmci_ctx_unset_notify

During our test, it is found that a warning can be trigger in try_grab_folio as follow:

————[ cut here ]———— WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: 1678 at mm/gup.c:147 try_grab_folio+0x106/0x130 Modules linked in: CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 1678 Comm: syz.3.31 Not tainted 6.15.0-rc5 #163 PREEMPT(undef) RIP: 0010:try_grab_folio+0x106/0x130 Call Trace: follow_huge_pmd+0x240/0x8e0 follow_pmd_mask.constprop.0.isra.0+0x40b/0x5c0 follow_pud_mask.constprop.0.isra.0+0x14a/0x170 follow_page_mask+0x1c2/0x1f0 __get_user_pages+0x176/0x950 __gup_longterm_locked+0x15b/0x1060 ? gup_fast+0x120/0x1f0 gup_fast_fallback+0x17e/0x230 get_user_pages_fast+0x5f/0x80 vmci_host_unlocked_ioctl+0x21c/0xf80 RIP: 0033:0x54d2cd —[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]—

Digging into the source, context->notify_page may init by get_user_pages_fast and can be seen in vmci_ctx_unset_notify which will try to put_page. However get_user_pages_fast is not finished here and lead to following try_grab_folio warning. The race condition is shown as follow:

cpu0 cpu1 vmci_host_do_set_notify vmci_host_setup_notify get_user_pages_fast(uva, 1, FOLL_WRITE, &context->notify_page); lockless_pages_from_mm gup_pgd_range gup_huge_pmd // update &context->notify_page vmci_host_do_set_notify vmci_ctx_unset_notify notify_page = context->notify_page; if (notify_page) put_page(notify_page); // page is freed __gup_longterm_locked __get_user_pages follow_trans_huge_pmd try_grab_folio // warn here

To slove this, use local variable page to make notify_page can be seen after finish get_user_pages_fast.

Weakness

The product contains a concurrent code sequence that requires temporary, exclusive access to a shared resource, but a timing window exists in which the shared resource can be modified by another code sequence operating concurrently.

Affected Software

Extended Description

A race condition occurs within concurrent environments, and it is effectively a property of a code sequence. Depending on the context, a code sequence may be in the form of a function call, a small number of instructions, a series of program invocations, etc. A race condition violates these properties, which are closely related:

A race condition exists when an “interfering code sequence” can still access the shared resource, violating exclusivity. The interfering code sequence could be “trusted” or “untrusted.” A trusted interfering code sequence occurs within the product; it cannot be modified by the attacker, and it can only be invoked indirectly. An untrusted interfering code sequence can be authored directly by the attacker, and typically it is external to the vulnerable product.

Potential Mitigations

• Minimize the usage of shared resources in order to remove as much complexity as possible from the control flow and to reduce the likelihood of unexpected conditions occurring.
• Additionally, this will minimize the amount of synchronization necessary and may even help to reduce the likelihood of a denial of service where an attacker may be able to repeatedly trigger a critical section (CWE-400).

Related Attack Patterns

• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/26.html
• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/29.html

References

• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/00ddc7dad55b7bbb78df80d6e174d0c4764dea0c
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1bd6406fb5f36c2bb1e96e27d4c3e9f4d09edde4
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/468aec888f838ce5174b96e0cb4396790d6f60ca
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/58a90db70aa6616411e5f69d1982d9b1dd97d774
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/6e3af836805ed1d7a699f76ec798626198917aa4
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/74095bbbb19ca74a0368d857603a2438c88ca86c
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/75b5313c80c39a26d27cbb602f968a05576c36f9
• https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/b4209e4b778e4e57d0636e1c9fc07a924dbc6043
• https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/10/msg00007.html
• https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2025/10/msg00008.html