CVE-2023-54281

Description

A deadlock flaw was found in the Linux kernel's Btrfs filesystem. During the inode lookup ioctl (BTRFS_IOC_INO_LOOKUP_USER), the code attempts to acquire an inode reference while holding a btree path lock. If the inode is not in memory, looking it up requires locking the same btree again, creating a circular locking dependency that can deadlock the system.

Statement

This can be triggered by unprivileged users via the BTRFS_IOC_INO_LOOKUP_USER ioctl on Btrfs filesystems. The deadlock causes affected processes to hang permanently. Syzkaller fuzzing discovered this issue through lockdep analysis.

Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details

Info alert:Important note

CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).

The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.

CVSS v3 Score Breakdown

Red HatNVDcve.org
Base Score5.5N/AN/A
Attack VectorLocalN/AN/A
Attack ComplexityLowN/AN/A
Privileges RequiredLowN/AN/A
User InteractionNoneN/AN/A
ScopeUnchangedN/AN/A
ConfidentialityNoneN/AN/A
Integrity ImpactNoneN/AN/A
Availability ImpactHighN/AN/A

Vector

Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Understanding the Weakness (CWE)

CWE-833

Availability

Technical Impact: DoS: Resource Consumption (CPU); DoS: Resource Consumption (Other); DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart

Each thread of execution will "hang" and prevent tasks from completing. In some cases, CPU consumption may occur if a lock check occurs in a tight loop.

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