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HIGH

ext4: fix use-after-free in ext4_orphan_cleanup

Published Dec 9, 2025

Description

I caught a issue as follows: ================================================================== BUG: KASAN: use-after-free in __list_add_valid+0x28/0x1a0 Read of size 8 at addr ffff88814b13f378 by task mount/710

CPU: 1 PID: 710 Comm: mount Not tainted 6.1.0-rc3-next #370 Call Trace: <TASK> dump_stack_lvl+0x73/0x9f print_report+0x25d/0x759 kasan_report+0xc0/0x120 __asan_load8+0x99/0x140 __list_add_valid+0x28/0x1a0 ext4_orphan_cleanup+0x564/0x9d0 [ext4] __ext4_fill_super+0x48e2/0x5300 [ext4] ext4_fill_super+0x19f/0x3a0 [ext4] get_tree_bdev+0x27b/0x450 ext4_get_tree+0x19/0x30 [ext4] vfs_get_tree+0x49/0x150 path_mount+0xaae/0x1350 do_mount+0xe2/0x110 __x64_sys_mount+0xf0/0x190 do_syscall_64+0x35/0x80 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x63/0xcd </TASK> [...] ==================================================================

Above issue may happen as follows: ------------------------------------- ext4_fill_super ext4_orphan_cleanup --- loop1: assume last_orphan is 12 --- list_add(&EXT4_I(inode)->i_orphan, &EXT4_SB(sb)->s_orphan) ext4_truncate --> return 0 ext4_inode_attach_jinode --> return -ENOMEM iput(inode) --> free inode<12> --- loop2: last_orphan is still 12 --- list_add(&EXT4_I(inode)->i_orphan, &EXT4_SB(sb)->s_orphan); // use inode<12> and trigger UAF

To solve this issue, we need to propagate the return value of ext4_inode_attach_jinode() appropriately.

Affected products

Remediation

Red Hat statement

This issue is triggered by a specially crafted disk image containing on-disk metadata inconsistencies. Exploitation requires that an attacker convince a user to download and use a malicious image from an untrusted source, a scenario with limited practical impact. Red Hat rates this as Low severity.

Weaknesses (1)

References (12)

Change history (0)

No recorded changes yet.

Sources
CVE.org / MITRE
Status PUBLISHED
Assigner Linux
Published Dec 9, 2025
Updated Aug 5, 2026
Reserved Dec 9, 2025
CISA Vulnrichment
Updated Jun 16, 2026
NVD
Status Deferred
Modified Aug 4, 2026
Red Hat
Severity Low
Public date Dec 9, 2025
ENISA EUVD
Assigner n/a
Published n/a
Updated n/a
Exploited since n/a
Link n/a