CVE-2024-35960
CriticalSummary
A vulnerability has been identified in the Linux kernel regarding the improper linking of new fs rules into the tree. This issue can lead to a situation where a rule with a refcount of 2 is not properly linked, resulting in a system crash when the flow group is deleted.
Risk Assessment
This vulnerability may lead to system crashes, threatening the stability and availability of services within the organization. If the bug occurs, it could result in data loss or interruption of critical applications.
Recommendation
It is recommended to update the Linux kernel to the latest version where this vulnerability has been fixed. Additionally, monitor systems for similar issues related to flow rule handling.
Original NVD description (English source)
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/mlx5: Properly link new fs rules into the tree Previously, add_rule_fg would only add newly created rules from the handle into the tree when they had a refcount of 1. On the other hand, create_flow_handle tries hard to find and reference already existing identical rules instead of creating new ones. These two behaviors can result in a situation where create_flow_handle 1) creates a new rule and references it, then 2) in a subsequent step during the same handle creation references it again, resulting in a rule with a refcount of 2 that is not linked into the tree, will have a NULL parent and root and will result in a crash when the flow group is deleted because del_sw_hw_rule, invoked on rule deletion, assumes node->parent is != NULL. This happened in the wild, due to another bug related to incorrect handling of duplicate pkt_reformat ids, which lead to the code in create_flow_handle incorrectly referencing a