In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:
md: fix a crash in mempool_free
There's a crash in mempool_free when running the lvm test shell/lvchange-rebuild-raid.sh.
The reason for the crash is this:
We fix this bug by moving bio_put before atomic_dec_and_test.
We also move rdev_dec_pending before atomic_dec_and_test as suggested by Neil Brown.
The function md_end_flush has a similar bug - we must call bio_put before we decrement the number of in-progress bios.
BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000000 #PF: supervisor write access in kernel mode #PF: error_code(0x0002) - not-present page PGD 11557f0067 P4D 11557f0067 PUD 0 Oops: 0002 [#1] PREEMPT SMP CPU: 0 PID: 73 Comm: kworker/0:1 Not tainted 6.1.0-rc3 #5 Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS 1.14.0-2 04/01/2014 Workqueue: kdelayd flush_expired_bios [dm_delay] RIP: 0010:mempool_free+0x47/0x80 Code: 48 89 ef 5b 5d ff e0 f3 c3 48 89 f7 e8 32 45 3f 00 48 63 53 08 48 89 c6 3b 53 04 7d 2d 48 8b 43 10 8d 4a 01 48 89 df 89 4b 08 <48> 89 2c d0 e8 b0 45 3f 00 48 8d 7b 30 5b 5d 31 c9 ba 01 00 00 00 RSP: 0018:ffff88910036bda8 EFLAGS: 00010093 RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: ffff8891037b65d8 RCX: 0000000000000001 RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000000202 RDI: ffff8891037b65d8 RBP: ffff8891447ba240 R08: 0000000000012908 R09: 00000000003d0900 R10: 0000000000000000 R11: 0000000000173544 R12: ffff889101a14000 R13: ffff8891562ac300 R14: ffff889102b41440 R15: ffffe8ffffa00d05 FS: 0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff88942fa00000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000 CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033 CR2: 0000000000000000 CR3: 0000001102e99000 CR4: 00000000000006b0 Call Trace: <TASK> clone_endio+0xf4/0x1c0 [dm_mod] clone_endio+0xf4/0x1c0 [dm_mod] __submit_bio+0x76/0x120 submit_bio_noacct_nocheck+0xb6/0x2a0 flush_expired_bios+0x28/0x2f [dm_delay] process_one_work+0x1b4/0x300 worker_thread+0x45/0x3e0 ? rescuer_thread+0x380/0x380 kthread+0xc2/0x100 ? kthread_complete_and_exit+0x20/0x20 ret_from_fork+0x1f/0x30 </TASK> Modules linked in: brd dm_delay dm_raid dm_mod af_packet uvesafb cfbfillrect cfbimgblt cn cfbcopyarea fb font fbdev tun autofs4 binfmt_misc configfs ipv6 virtio_rng virtio_balloon rng_core virtio_net pcspkr net_failover failover qemu_fw_cfg button mousedev raid10 raid456 libcrc32c async_raid6_recov async_memcpy async_pq raid6_pq async_xor xor async_tx raid1 raid0 md_mod sd_mod t10_pi crc64_rocksoft crc64 virtio_scsi scsi_mod evdev psmouse bsg scsi_common [last unloaded: brd] CR2: 0000000000000000 ---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]---
| Software | From | Fixed in |
|---|---|---|
| linux / linux_kernel | - | 4.9.337 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 4.10 | 4.14.303 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 4.15 | 4.19.270 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 4.20 | 5.4.229 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 5.5 | 5.10.163 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 5.11 | 5.15.87 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 5.16 | 6.0.17 |
| linux / linux_kernel | 6.1 | 6.1.3 |
A security vulnerability is a weakness in software, hardware, or configuration that can be exploited to compromise confidentiality, integrity, or availability. Many vulnerabilities are tracked as CVEs (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures), which provide a standardized identifier so teams can coordinate patching, mitigation, and risk assessment across tools and vendors.
CVSS (Common Vulnerability Scoring System) estimates technical severity, but it doesn't automatically equal business risk. Prioritize using context like internet exposure, affected asset criticality, known exploitation (proof-of-concept or in-the-wild), and whether compensating controls exist. A "Medium" CVSS on an exposed, production system can be more urgent than a "Critical" on an isolated, non-production host.
A vulnerability is the underlying weakness. An exploit is the method or code used to take advantage of it. A zero-day is a vulnerability that is unknown to the vendor or has no publicly available fix when attackers begin using it. In practice, risk increases sharply when exploitation becomes reliable or widespread.
Recurring findings usually come from incomplete Asset Discovery, inconsistent patch management, inherited images, and configuration drift. In modern environments, you also need to watch the software supply chain: dependencies, containers, build pipelines, and third-party services can reintroduce the same weakness even after you patch a single host. Unknown or unmanaged assets (often called Shadow IT) are a common reason the same issues resurface.
Use a simple, repeatable triage model: focus first on externally exposed assets, high-value systems (identity, VPN, email, production), vulnerabilities with known exploits, and issues that enable remote code execution or privilege escalation. Then enforce patch SLAs and track progress using consistent metrics so remediation is steady, not reactive.
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