CVE-2025-21737 Details
Description
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ceph: fix memory leak in ceph_mds_auth_match() We now free the temporary target path substring allocation on every possible branch, instead of omitting the default branch. In some cases, a memory leak occured, which could rapidly crash the system (depending on how many file accesses were attempted). This was detected in production because it caused a continuous memory growth, eventually triggering kernel OOM and completely hard-locking the kernel. Relevant kmemleak stacktrace: unreferenced object 0xffff888131e69900 (size 128): comm "git", pid 66104, jiffies 4295435999 hex dump (first 32 bytes): 76 6f 6c 75 6d 65 73 2f 63 6f 6e 74 61 69 6e 65 volumes/containe 72 73 2f 67 69 74 65 61 2f 67 69 74 65 61 2f 67 rs/gitea/gitea/g backtrace (crc 2f3bb450): [<ffffffffaa68fb49>] __kmalloc_noprof+0x359/0x510 [<ffffffffc32bf1df>] ceph_mds_check_access+0x5bf/0x14e0 [ceph] [<ffffffffc3235722>] ceph_open+0x312/0xd80 [ceph] [<ffffffffaa7dd786>] do_dentry_open+0x456/0x1120 [<ffffffffaa7e3729>] vfs_open+0x79/0x360 [<ffffffffaa832875>] path_openat+0x1de5/0x4390 [<ffffffffaa834fcc>] do_filp_open+0x19c/0x3c0 [<ffffffffaa7e44a1>] do_sys_openat2+0x141/0x180 [<ffffffffaa7e4945>] __x64_sys_open+0xe5/0x1a0 [<ffffffffac2cc2f7>] do_syscall_64+0xb7/0x210 [<ffffffffac400130>] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x77/0x7f It can be triggered by mouting a subdirectory of a CephFS filesystem, and then trying to access files on this subdirectory with an auth token using a path-scoped capability: $ ceph auth get client.services [client.services] key = REDACTED caps mds = "allow rw fsname=cephfs path=/volumes/" caps mon = "allow r fsname=cephfs" caps osd = "allow rw tag cephfs data=cephfs" $ cat /proc/self/mounts services@[REDACTED].cephfs=/volumes/containers /ceph/containers ceph rw,noatime,name=services,secret=<hidden>,ms_mode=prefer-crc,mount_timeout=300,acl,mon_addr=[REDACTED]:3300,recover_session=clean 0 0 $ seq 1 1000000 | xargs -P32 --replace={} touch /ceph/containers/file-{} && \ seq 1 1000000 | xargs -P32 --replace={} cat /ceph/containers/file-{} [ idryomov: combine if statements, rename rc to path_matched and make it a bool, formatting ]
A memory leak vulnerability has been identified in the Linux kernel's Ceph file system component. The issue arises in the 'ceph_mds_auth_match()' function, where temporary allocations for target path substrings were not properly freed in all execution branches. This oversight led to a memory leak that could cause the system to crash, particularly under heavy file access. The vulnerability was observed in production environments, where it caused continuous memory consumption, eventually triggering a kernel out-of-memory condition that locked up the system.
Metrics
CVSS 4.0 Severity and Vector Strings:
No CVSS 4.0 data is available for this CVE.
CVSS 3.x Severity and Vector Strings:
No data available for CVSS Version 2.0 on this CVE.
CISA-ADP
Assessed Oct 1, 2025References to Advisories, Solutions, and Tools
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| URL | Source(s) | Tag(s) |
|---|---|---|
| https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/146109fe936ac07f8f60cd6267543688985b96bc | kernel.org | Patch |
| https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/2b6086c5efe5c7bd6e0eb440d96c26ca0d20d9d7 | kernel.org | Patch |
| https://git.kernel.org/stable/c/3b7d93db450e9d8ead80d75e2a303248f1528c35 | kernel.org | Patch |
Weakness Enumeration
| CWE-ID | CWE Name | Source |
|---|---|---|
| CWE-401 | Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime | [email protected] |
| CWE-401 | Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime | CISA-ADP |
Affected Products
| Product | Versions |
|---|---|
| linux linux kernel | >= 6.10, < 6.12.14 >= 6.13, < 6.13.3 |
CPE
Remediation
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Change History
5 change records found show changes
| Date | Action | Recorded By |
|---|---|---|
| Jun 17, 2026 | CVE Modified | kernel.org |
| Jun 17, 2026 | CVE Modified | CISA-ADP |
| Oct 1, 2025 | CVE Modified | CISA-ADP |
| Mar 6, 2025 | Initial Analysis | [email protected] |
| Feb 27, 2025 | New CVE Received | kernel.org |