CVE-2025-68245

CVE-2025-68245

published December 16, 2025

CVSS
—
EPSS
0%
Percentile
9.5
In the wild
Unconfirmed
What it is

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

net: netpoll: fix incorrect refcount handling causing incorrect cleanup

commit efa95b01da18 ("netpoll: fix use after free") incorrectly

ignored the refcount and prematurely set dev->npinfo to NULL during

netpoll cleanup, leading to improper behavior and memory leaks.

Scenario causing lack of proper cleanup:

1) A netpoll is associated with a NIC (e.g., eth0) and netdev->npinfo is

allocated, and refcnt = 1

- Keep in mind that npinfo is shared among all netpoll instances. In

this case, there is just one.

2) Another netpoll is also associated with the same NIC and

npinfo->refcnt += 1.

- Now dev->npinfo->refcnt = 2;

- There is just one npinfo associated to the netdev.

3) When the first netpolls goes to clean up:

- The first cleanup succeeds and clears np->dev->npinfo, ignoring

refcnt.

- It basically calls `RCU_INIT_POINTER(np->dev->npinfo, NULL);`

- Set dev->npinfo = NULL, without proper cleanup

- No ->ndo_netpoll_cleanup() is either called

4) Now the second target tries to clean up

- The second cleanup fails because np->dev->npinfo is already NULL.

* In this case, ops->ndo_netpoll_cleanup() was never called, and

the skb pool is not cleaned as well (for the second netpoll

instance)

- This leaks npinfo and skbpool skbs, which is clearly reported by

kmemleak.

Revert commit efa95b01da18 ("netpoll: fix use after free") and adds

clarifying comments emphasizing that npinfo cleanup should only happen

once the refcount reaches zero, ensuring stable and correct netpoll

behavior.

The record
Technical detail
CVSS
Not scored
CVSS v4.0
Not supplied
EPSS
0.00201 · 9.5th percentile
Published
2025-12-16T20:15Z
References (8)
EPSS history
Timeline
  • 16 DEC 14:21Z
    net: netpoll: fix incorrect refcount handling causing incorrect cleanup
    cvelistv5