Medium · published February 26, 2025
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
drivers: staging: rtl8723bs: Fix deadlock in rtw_surveydone_event_callback()
There is a deadlock in rtw_surveydone_event_callback(),
which is shown below:
(Thread 1) | (Thread 2)
| _set_timer()
rtw_surveydone_event_callback()| mod_timer()
spin_lock_bh() //(1) | (wait a time)
... | rtw_scan_timeout_handler()
del_timer_sync() | spin_lock_bh() //(2)
(wait timer to stop) | ...
We hold pmlmepriv->lock in position (1) of thread 1 and use
del_timer_sync() to wait timer to stop, but timer handler
also need pmlmepriv->lock in position (2) of thread 2.
As a result, rtw_surveydone_event_callback() will block forever.
This patch extracts del_timer_sync() from the protection of
spin_lock_bh(), which could let timer handler to obtain
the needed lock. What`s more, we change spin_lock_bh() in
rtw_scan_timeout_handler() to spin_lock_irq(). Otherwise,
spin_lock_bh() will also cause deadlock() in timer handler.
| Product | Versions | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| linux/linux_kernel | < 5.15.47 | 5.15.47 |
| linux/linux_kernel | ≥ 5.16, < 5.17.15 | 5.17.15 |
| linux/linux_kernel | ≥ 5.18, < 5.18.4 | 5.18.4 |