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Linux Kernel CVE-2024-40962

MEDIUM
NULL Pointer Dereference (CWE-476)
2024-07-12 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
5.5
CVSS 3.1 · NVD
View

Vulnerability Assessment

Weakness
CWE
OWASP Top 10:2025
A10:2025 - Mishandling of Exceptional Conditions
ASVS 5.0
V16 - Security Logging and Error Handling Null pointer safety, defensive checks
MITRE ATT&CK

1 technique across 1 tactic: Impact

The technique list with ATT&CK links and the kill-chain view is part of the Basic plan and up.

Impact

CVSS score of 5.5 (MEDIUM). Attack characteristics: local attack vector, low complexity, low privileges required, no user interaction not required.

Exploit ScenarioDerived

A local attacker with access to the system could crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer.

This Month Plan within 30 days. Why: MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9).
Patch available 0.2% exploitation probability (EPSS)

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AnalysisAI

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: btrfs: zoned: allocate dummy checksums for zoned NODATASUM writes Shin'ichiro reported that when he's running fstests' test-case. Rated medium severity (CVSS 5.5), this vulnerability is low attack complexity. This NULL Pointer Dereference vulnerability could allow attackers to crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer.

RemediationAI

A vendor patch is available. Apply the latest security update as soon as possible. Check pointers before dereferencing. Use static analysis tools to detect null pointer paths.

Affects your stack

Find out whether the stacks and servers you run are on an affected version.

Checking this CVE against your own stacks and servers is part of the Basic plan and up.

Technical ContextAI · show details

This vulnerability is classified as NULL Pointer Dereference (CWE-476), which allows attackers to crash the application by dereferencing a null pointer. In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: btrfs: zoned: allocate dummy checksums for zoned NODATASUM writes Shin'ichiro reported that when he's running fstests' test-case btrfs/167 on emulated zoned devices, he's seeing the following NULL pointer dereference in 'btrfs_zone_finish_endio()': Oops: general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xdffffc0000000011: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP KASAN NOPTI KASAN: null-ptr-deref in range [0x0000000000000088-0x000000000000008f] CPU: 4 PID: 2332440 Comm: kworker/u80:15 Tainted: G W 6.10.0-rc2-kts+ #4 Hardware name: Supermicro Super Server/X11SPi-TF, BIOS 3.3 02/21/2020 Workqueue: btrfs-endio-write btrfs_work_helper [btrfs] RIP: 0010:btrfs_zone_finish_endio.part.0+0x34/0x160 [btrfs] RSP: 0018:ffff88867f107a90 EFLAGS: 00010206 RAX: dffffc0000000000 RBX: 0000000000000000 RCX: ffffffff893e5534 RDX: 0000000000000011 RSI: 0000000000000004 RDI: 0000000000000088 RBP: 0000000000000002 R08: 0000000000000001 R09: ffffed1081696028 R10: ffff88840b4b0143 R11: ffff88834dfff600 R12: ffff88840b4b0000 R13: 0000000000020000 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: ffff888530ad5210 FS: 0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff888e3f800000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000 CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033 CR2: 00007f87223fff38 CR3: 00000007a7c6a002 CR4: 00000000007706f0 DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000 DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000fffe0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400 PKRU: 55555554 Call Trace: <TASK> ? __die_body.cold+0x19/0x27 ? die_addr+0x46/0x70 ? exc_general_protection+0x14f/0x250 ? asm_exc_general_protection+0x26/0x30 ? do_raw_read_unlock+0x44/0x70 ? btrfs_zone_finish_endio.part.0+0x34/0x160 [btrfs] btrfs_finish_one_ordered+0x5d9/0x19a0 [btrfs] ? __pfx_lock_release+0x10/0x10 ? do_raw_write_lock+0x90/0x260 ? __pfx_do_raw_write_lock+0x10/0x10 ? __pfx_btrfs_finish_one_ordered+0x10/0x10 [btrfs] ? _raw_write_unlock+0x23/0x40 ? btrfs_finish_ordered_zoned+0x5a9/0x850 [btrfs] ? lock_acquire+0x435/0x500 btrfs_work_helper+0x1b1/0xa70 [btrfs] ? __schedule+0x10a8/0x60b0 ? __pfx___might_resched+0x10/0x10 process_one_work+0x862/0x1410 ? __pfx_lock_acquire+0x10/0x10 ? __pfx_process_one_work+0x10/0x10 ? assign_work+0x16c/0x240 worker_thread+0x5e6/0x1010 ? __pfx_worker_thread+0x10/0x10 kthread+0x2c3/0x3a0 ? trace_irq_enable.constprop.0+0xce/0x110 ? __pfx_kthread+0x10/0x10 ret_from_fork+0x31/0x70 ? __pfx_kthread+0x10/0x10 ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 </TASK> Enabling CONFIG_BTRFS_ASSERT revealed the following assertion to trigger: assertion failed: !list_empty(&ordered->list), in fs/btrfs/zoned.c:1815 This indicates, that we're missing the checksums list on the ordered_extent. As btrfs/167 is doing a NOCOW write this is to be expected. Further analysis with drgn confirmed the assumption: >>> inode = prog.crashed_thread().stack_trace()[11]['ordered'].inode >>> btrfs_inode = drgn.container_of(inode, "struct btrfs_inode", \ "vfs_inode") >>> print(btrfs_inode.flags) (u32)1 As zoned emulation mode simulates conventional zones on regular devices, we cannot use zone-append for writing. But we're only attaching dummy checksums if we're doing a zone-append write. So for NOCOW zoned data writes on conventional zones, also attach a dummy checksum. Affected products include: Linux Linux Kernel.

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Severity by source

NVD PRIMARY 5.5 MEDIUM
AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

Primary rating from NVD · only source for this CVE.

CVSS VectorNVD

Attack Vector
Local
Attack Complexity
Low
Privileges Required
Low
User Interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

DescriptionNVD

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

btrfs: zoned: allocate dummy checksums for zoned NODATASUM writes

Shin'ichiro reported that when he's running fstests' test-case btrfs/167 on emulated zoned devices, he's seeing the following NULL pointer dereference in 'btrfs_zone_finish_endio()':

Oops: general protection fault, probably for non-canonical address 0xdffffc0000000011: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP KASAN NOPTI KASAN: null-ptr-deref in range [0x0000000000000088-0x000000000000008f] CPU: 4 PID: 2332440 Comm: kworker/u80:15 Tainted: G W 6.10.0-rc2-kts+ #4 Hardware name: Supermicro Super Server/X11SPi-TF, BIOS 3.3 02/21/2020 Workqueue: btrfs-endio-write btrfs_work_helper [btrfs] RIP: 0010:btrfs_zone_finish_endio.part.0+0x34/0x160 [btrfs]

RSP: 0018:ffff88867f107a90 EFLAGS: 00010206 RAX: dffffc0000000000 RBX: 0000000000000000 RCX: ffffffff893e5534 RDX: 0000000000000011 RSI: 0000000000000004 RDI: 0000000000000088 RBP: 0000000000000002 R08: 0000000000000001 R09: ffffed1081696028 R10: ffff88840b4b0143 R11: ffff88834dfff600 R12: ffff88840b4b0000 R13: 0000000000020000 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: ffff888530ad5210 FS: 0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff888e3f800000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000 CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033 CR2: 00007f87223fff38 CR3: 00000007a7c6a002 CR4: 00000000007706f0 DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000 DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000fffe0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400 PKRU: 55555554 Call Trace: <TASK> ? __die_body.cold+0x19/0x27 ? die_addr+0x46/0x70 ? exc_general_protection+0x14f/0x250 ? asm_exc_general_protection+0x26/0x30 ? do_raw_read_unlock+0x44/0x70 ? btrfs_zone_finish_endio.part.0+0x34/0x160 [btrfs] btrfs_finish_one_ordered+0x5d9/0x19a0 [btrfs] ? __pfx_lock_release+0x10/0x10 ? do_raw_write_lock+0x90/0x260 ? __pfx_do_raw_write_lock+0x10/0x10 ? __pfx_btrfs_finish_one_ordered+0x10/0x10 [btrfs] ? _raw_write_unlock+0x23/0x40 ? btrfs_finish_ordered_zoned+0x5a9/0x850 [btrfs] ? lock_acquire+0x435/0x500 btrfs_work_helper+0x1b1/0xa70 [btrfs] ? __schedule+0x10a8/0x60b0 ? __pfx___might_resched+0x10/0x10 process_one_work+0x862/0x1410 ? __pfx_lock_acquire+0x10/0x10 ? __pfx_process_one_work+0x10/0x10 ? assign_work+0x16c/0x240 worker_thread+0x5e6/0x1010 ? __pfx_worker_thread+0x10/0x10 kthread+0x2c3/0x3a0 ? trace_irq_enable.constprop.0+0xce/0x110 ? __pfx_kthread+0x10/0x10 ret_from_fork+0x31/0x70 ? __pfx_kthread+0x10/0x10 ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 </TASK>

Enabling CONFIG_BTRFS_ASSERT revealed the following assertion to trigger:

assertion failed: !list_empty(&ordered->list), in fs/btrfs/zoned.c:1815

This indicates, that we're missing the checksums list on the ordered_extent. As btrfs/167 is doing a NOCOW write this is to be expected.

Further analysis with drgn confirmed the assumption:

>>> inode = prog.crashed_thread().stack_trace()[11]['ordered'].inode >>> btrfs_inode = drgn.container_of(inode, "struct btrfs_inode", \ "vfs_inode") >>> print(btrfs_inode.flags) (u32)1

As zoned emulation mode simulates conventional zones on regular devices, we cannot use zone-append for writing. But we're only attaching dummy checksums if we're doing a zone-append write.

So for NOCOW zoned data writes on conventional zones, also attach a dummy checksum.

Threat Intelligence Overview

EPSS Score
0.2%
Top 85% exploitable
Data Quality
2 sources
Confidence: Low

How this decision was reached

The engine reads each signal below and applies a fixed list of rules from top to bottom. The first rule that matches sets the recommended action – like a statement, every line is shown.

SignalValue
Severity MEDIUM
CISA KEV No
Public POC No
EPSS 0.2%
Patch available Yes
Active threat No
Deciding rule
MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9)
What every action level means
Emergency Immediate action required. Criteria: CRITICAL + in CISA KEV (actively exploited) without patch, OR CRITICAL + EPSS > 30% without patch, OR CRITICAL + active threat signals without patch.
Act Now Prioritize within 24-48h. Criteria: in KEV with patch available, OR CRITICAL + public POC, OR HIGH + EPSS > 10%, OR CRITICAL + active threat, OR any CRITICAL severity.
This Week Schedule remediation this week. Criteria: HIGH severity (CVSS 7.0-8.9). Patch within normal change window.
This Month Plan within 30 days. Criteria: MEDIUM severity (CVSS 4.0-6.9), lower exploitation probability. Include in regular patch cycle.
Monitor Track and reassess. Criteria: LOW severity (CVSS 0.1-3.9), minimal exploitation risk. No immediate action needed.

SSVC AssessmentENISA

SSVC Decision· derived
Defer
Exploitation· derived
None
System Exposure· derived
Small
Automatable· derived
No
Human Impact· derived
Medium

Priority Score

28
Low Medium High Critical
KEV: 0
EPSS: 0
CVSS: +28
PoC: 0
Weaponized: 0
Threat intel: 0
Gov advisory: 0

Attack Technique

A null pointer dereference occurs when a program attempts to access memory through a pointer that has been set to NULL (address 0x0).

Denial of Service attacks render applications or systems unavailable by overwhelming resources or triggering failure conditions.

Affected Products (CPE)NVD

cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:*:*:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.10:rc1:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.10:rc2:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.10:rc3:*:*:*:*:*:*
cpe:2.3:o:linux:linux_kernel:6.10:rc4:*:*:*:*:*:*
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