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Linux Kernel CVE-2025-38490

HIGH
Double Free (CWE-415)
2025-07-28 416baaa9-dc9f-4396-8d5f-8c081fb06d67
7.8
CVSS 3.1 · NVD
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Severity by source

NVD PRIMARY
7.8 HIGH
AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
vuln.today AI
4.7 MEDIUM

Requires the specific libwx driver/hardware and a racy double-free hit during Rx (AC:H, PR:L, AV:L); demonstrated impact is a kernel panic, so A:H with no confirmed C/I impact.

3.1 AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
4.0 AV:L/AC:H/AT:P/PR:L/UI:N/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N
SUSE
HIGH
qualitative
Red Hat
7.8 HIGH
qualitative

Primary rating from NVD.

CVSS VectorNVD

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

Lifecycle Timeline

2
Analysis Generated
Jul 30, 2026 - 08:16 vuln.today
CVE Published
Jul 28, 2025 - 12:15 nvd
HIGH 7.8

DescriptionNVD

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

net: libwx: remove duplicate page_pool_put_full_page()

page_pool_put_full_page() should only be invoked when freeing Rx buffers or building a skb if the size is too short. At other times, the pages need to be reused. So remove the redundant page put. In the original code, double free pages cause kernel panic:

[ 876.949834] __irq_exit_rcu+0xc7/0x130 [ 876.949836] common_interrupt+0xb8/0xd0 [ 876.949838] </IRQ> [ 876.949838] <TASK> [ 876.949840] asm_common_interrupt+0x22/0x40 [ 876.949841] RIP: 0010:cpuidle_enter_state+0xc2/0x420 [ 876.949843] Code: 00 00 e8 d1 1d 5e ff e8 ac f0 ff ff 49 89 c5 0f 1f 44 00 00 31 ff e8 cd fc 5c ff 45 84 ff 0f 85 40 02 00 00 fb 0f 1f 44 00 00 <45> 85 f6 0f 88 84 01 00 00 49 63 d6 48 8d 04 52 48 8d 04 82 49 8d [ 876.949844] RSP: 0018:ffffaa7340267e78 EFLAGS: 00000246 [ 876.949845] RAX: ffff9e3f135be000 RBX: 0000000000000002 RCX: 0000000000000000 [ 876.949846] RDX: 000000cc2dc4cb7c RSI: ffffffff89ee49ae RDI: ffffffff89ef9f9e [ 876.949847] RBP: ffff9e378f940800 R08: 0000000000000002 R09: 00000000000000ed [ 876.949848] R10: 000000000000afc8 R11: ffff9e3e9e5a9b6c R12: ffffffff8a6d8580 [ 876.949849] R13: 000000cc2dc4cb7c R14: 0000000000000002 R15: 0000000000000000 [ 876.949852] ? cpuidle_enter_state+0xb3/0x420 [ 876.949855] cpuidle_enter+0x29/0x40 [ 876.949857] cpuidle_idle_call+0xfd/0x170 [ 876.949859] do_idle+0x7a/0xc0 [ 876.949861] cpu_startup_entry+0x25/0x30 [ 876.949862] start_secondary+0x117/0x140 [ 876.949864] common_startup_64+0x13e/0x148 [ 876.949867] </TASK> [ 876.949868] ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]--- [ 876.949869] ------------[ cut here ]------------ [ 876.949870] list_del corruption, ffffead40445a348->next is NULL [ 876.949873] WARNING: CPU: 14 PID: 0 at lib/list_debug.c:52 __list_del_entry_valid_or_report+0x67/0x120 [ 876.949875] Modules linked in: snd_hrtimer(E) bnep(E) binfmt_misc(E) amdgpu(E) squashfs(E) vfat(E) loop(E) fat(E) amd_atl(E) snd_hda_codec_realtek(E) intel_rapl_msr(E) snd_hda_codec_generic(E) intel_rapl_common(E) snd_hda_scodec_component(E) snd_hda_codec_hdmi(E) snd_hda_intel(E) edac_mce_amd(E) snd_intel_dspcfg(E) snd_hda_codec(E) snd_hda_core(E) amdxcp(E) kvm_amd(E) snd_hwdep(E) gpu_sched(E) drm_panel_backlight_quirks(E) cec(E) snd_pcm(E) drm_buddy(E) snd_seq_dummy(E) drm_ttm_helper(E) btusb(E) kvm(E) snd_seq_oss(E) btrtl(E) ttm(E) btintel(E) snd_seq_midi(E) btbcm(E) drm_exec(E) snd_seq_midi_event(E) i2c_algo_bit(E) snd_rawmidi(E) bluetooth(E) drm_suballoc_helper(E) irqbypass(E) snd_seq(E) ghash_clmulni_intel(E) sha512_ssse3(E) drm_display_helper(E) aesni_intel(E) snd_seq_device(E) rfkill(E) snd_timer(E) gf128mul(E) drm_client_lib(E) drm_kms_helper(E) snd(E) i2c_piix4(E) joydev(E) soundcore(E) wmi_bmof(E) ccp(E) k10temp(E) i2c_smbus(E) gpio_amdpt(E) i2c_designware_platform(E) gpio_generic(E) sg(E) [ 876.949914] i2c_designware_core(E) sch_fq_codel(E) parport_pc(E) drm(E) ppdev(E) lp(E) parport(E) fuse(E) nfnetlink(E) ip_tables(E) ext4 crc16 mbcache jbd2 sd_mod sfp mdio_i2c i2c_core txgbe ahci ngbe pcs_xpcs libahci libwx r8169 phylink libata realtek ptp pps_core video wmi [ 876.949933] CPU: 14 UID: 0 PID: 0 Comm: swapper/14 Kdump: loaded Tainted: G W E 6.16.0-rc2+ #20 PREEMPT(voluntary) [ 876.949935] Tainted: [W]=WARN, [E]=UNSIGNED_MODULE [ 876.949936] Hardware name: Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. MS-7E16/X670E GAMING PLUS WIFI (MS-7E16), BIOS 1.90 12/31/2024 [ 876.949936] RIP: 0010:__list_del_entry_valid_or_report+0x67/0x120 [ 876.949938] Code: 00 00 00 48 39 7d 08 0f 85 a6 00 00 00 5b b8 01 00 00 00 5d 41 5c e9 73 0d 93 ff 48 89 fe 48 c7 c7 a0 31 e8 89 e8 59 7c b3 ff <0f> 0b 31 c0 5b 5d 41 5c e9 57 0d 93 ff 48 89 fe 48 c7 c7 c8 31 e8 [ 876.949940] RSP: 0018:ffffaa73405d0c60 EFLAGS: 00010282 [ 876.949941] RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: ffffead40445a348 RCX: 0000000000000000 [ 876.949942] RDX: 0000000000000105 RSI: 00000 ---truncated---

AnalysisAI

Denial-of-service (kernel panic) in the Linux kernel's libwx network driver - the shared base module for Wangxun txgbe/ngbe Ethernet controllers - arises from a duplicate page_pool_put_full_page() call in the Rx path that double-frees page-pool pages, corrupting the free list and crashing the host (CWE-415). It affects 6.16 release-candidate kernels (rc1-rc6) on systems using Wangxun NICs and is triggered by ordinary received network traffic rather than a crafted payload. There is no public exploit identified at time of analysis and EPSS is very low (0.15%); the issue is a pre-release regression fixed upstream before the 6.16 final release.

Technical ContextAI

libwx is the common Linux driver library backing Wangxun's txgbe (10G) and ngbe (1G/2.5G) Ethernet drivers, which use the kernel's page_pool API to recycle DMA-mapped pages for the Rx ring. page_pool_put_full_page() is meant to be called only when a buffer is actually being released (freeing Rx buffers, or when a fragment is too short to build an skb); at all other times the page must be kept for reuse. The buggy code invoked page_pool_put_full_page() a second time on pages that were still in use, producing a classic double-free (CWE-415). The second free corrupts the page allocator/page_pool free list (the trace shows 'list_del corruption ... next is NULL' and a WARN in __list_del_entry_valid_or_report), leading to the observed panic. The affected CPE set is Linux kernel 6.16-rc1 through 6.16-rc6.

RemediationAI

Update to a Linux 6.16 build that includes the fix that removes the redundant page_pool_put_full_page() call; the change is available as upstream fix commits (Upstream fix available via PR/commit - a released patched tag is not independently confirmed in the provided data), notably https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/003e4765d8661be97e650a833868c53d35574130, https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/08d18bda0d03f5ec376929a8c6c4495f9594593a, https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/1b7e585c04cd5f0731dd25ffd396277e55fae0e6, and https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3c91a56762b1f0d1e4af2d86c2cba83b61ed9eaa. As an immediate compensating control on affected 6.16-rc hosts, avoid running the libwx-based txgbe/ngbe driver - either blacklist the module (modprobe blacklist txgbe ngbe libwx) where the Wangxun NIC is not required, or roll back to a stable kernel line that predates the regression; the trade-off is loss of connectivity on that NIC or reverting other 6.16-rc changes. Production systems should not be running release-candidate kernels, so moving to a GA kernel is the cleanest mitigation.

Vendor StatusVendor

SUSE

Severity: Important
Product Status
Container suse/hpc/warewulf4-x86_64/sle-hpc-node:15.6.17.8.111 Image SLES15-SP6 Image SLES15-SP6-BYOS Image SLES15-SP6-BYOS-Azure Image SLES15-SP6-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-BYOS-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-Aliyun Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-Azure Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-GDC Image SLES15-SP6-CHOST-BYOS-SAP-CCloud Image SLES15-SP6-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-EC2-ECS-HVM Image SLES15-SP6-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-HPC-BYOS Image SLES15-SP6-HPC-BYOS-Azure Image SLES15-SP6-HPC-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-HPC-BYOS-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-HPC-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-HPC-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-Hardened-BYOS Image SLES15-SP6-Hardened-BYOS-Azure Image SLES15-SP6-Hardened-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-Hardened-BYOS-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-SAP Image SLES15-SP6-SAP-Azure Image SLES15-SP6-SAP-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-SAP-GCE Image SLES15-SP6-SAPCAL Image SLES15-SP6-SAPCAL-Azure Image SLES15-SP6-SAPCAL-EC2 Image SLES15-SP6-SAPCAL-GCE Affected
Container suse/sl-micro/6.0/base-os-container:2.1.3-7.50 Container suse/sl-micro/6.1/base-os-container:2.2.1-5.29 Image SL-Micro Image SL-Micro-Azure Image SL-Micro-BYOS-Azure Image SL-Micro-BYOS-EC2 Image SL-Micro-BYOS-GCE Image SL-Micro-EC2 Image SLE-Micro Image SLE-Micro-Azure Image SLE-Micro-BYOS Image SLE-Micro-BYOS-Azure Image SLE-Micro-BYOS-EC2 Image SLE-Micro-BYOS-GCE Image SLE-Micro-EC2 Image SLE-Micro-GCE Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Proxy-BYOS-Azure Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Proxy-BYOS-EC2 Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Proxy-BYOS-GCE Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-Azure-llc Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-Azure-ltd Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-BYOS-Azure Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-BYOS-EC2 Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-BYOS-GCE Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-EC2-llc Image SUSE-Multi-Linux-Manager-Server-EC2-ltd Affected
Container suse/sl-micro/6.0/kvm-os-container:2.1.3-6.73 Container suse/sl-micro/6.1/kvm-os-container:2.2.1-5.32 Affected
Container suse/sl-micro/6.0/rt-os-container:2.1.3-7.85 Container suse/sl-micro/6.1/rt-os-container:2.2.1-5.24 Affected
Image SLES-Azure-3P Image SLES-Azure-Basic Image SLES-Azure-Standard Image SLES-BYOS-Azure Image SLES-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES-BYOS-GCE Image SLES-CHOST-BYOS-Aliyun Image SLES-CHOST-BYOS-Azure Image SLES-CHOST-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES-CHOST-BYOS-GCE Image SLES-CHOST-BYOS-GDC Image SLES-CHOST-BYOS-SAP-CCloud Image SLES-EC2 Image SLES-EC2-ECS Image SLES-GCE Image SLES-GCE-3P Image SLES-Hardened-BYOS-Azure Image SLES-Hardened-BYOS-EC2 Image SLES-Hardened-BYOS-GCE Image SLES-SAPCAL-Azure Image SLES-SAPCAL-EC2 Image SLES-SAPCAL-GCE Affected

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CVE-2025-38490 vulnerability details – vuln.today

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