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OpenAdvisories
Medium · 6.2 CVE-2024-36888 EUVD-2024-36240

workqueue: Fix selection of wake_cpu in kick_pool()

Published May 30, 2024 · Updated May 11, 2026 · Assigned by Linux

Vendor: Linux Product: Linux Package: linux Package: linux Package: linux-allwinner-5.19 Package: linux-aws Package: linux-aws-5.0 Package: linux-aws-5.11 Package: linux-aws-5.13 Package: linux-aws-5.19 Package: linux-aws-5.3 Package: linux-aws-5.8 Package: linux-aws-6.2 Package: linux-aws-6.8 Package: linux-azure Package: linux-azure-5.11 Package: linux-azure-5.13 Package: linux-azure-5.19 Package: linux-azure-5.3 Package: linux-azure-5.8 Package: linux-azure-6.2 Package: linux-azure-6.8 Package: linux-azure-edge Package: linux-azure-fde Package: linux-azure-fde-5.19 Package: linux-azure-fde-6.2 Package: linux-gcp Package: linux-gcp-5.11 Package: linux-gcp-5.13 Package: linux-gcp-5.19 Package: linux-gcp-5.3 Package: linux-gcp-5.8 Package: linux-gcp-6.2 Package: linux-gcp-6.8 Package: linux-gke Package: linux-gke-4.15 Package: linux-gke-5.15 Package: linux-gke-5.4 Package: linux-gkeop-5.4 Package: linux-hwe Package: linux-hwe-5.11 Package: linux-hwe-5.13 Package: linux-hwe-5.19 Package: linux-hwe-5.8 Package: linux-hwe-6.2 Package: linux-hwe-6.8 Package: linux-hwe-edge Package: linux-ibm Package: linux-intel-5.13 Package: linux-intel-iot-realtime Package: linux-lowlatency Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-5.19 Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-6.2 Package: linux-lowlatency-hwe-6.8 Package: linux-nvidia Package: linux-nvidia-6.2 Package: linux-nvidia-6.8 Package: linux-nvidia-lowlatency Package: linux-oem Package: linux-oem-5.10 Package: linux-oem-5.13 Package: linux-oem-5.14 Package: linux-oem-5.17 Package: linux-oem-5.6 Package: linux-oem-6.0 Package: linux-oem-6.1 Package: linux-oem-6.8 Package: linux-oracle Package: linux-oracle-5.0 Package: linux-oracle-5.11 Package: linux-oracle-5.13 Package: linux-oracle-5.3 Package: linux-oracle-5.8 Package: linux-oracle-6.8 Package: linux-raspi Package: linux-raspi-realtime Package: linux-raspi2 Package: linux-realtime Package: linux-riscv Package: linux-riscv-5.11 Package: linux-riscv-5.19 Package: linux-riscv-5.8 Package: linux-riscv-6.8 Package: linux-starfive-5.19 Package: linux-starfive-6.2 Platform: Linux Ecosystem: Debian Ecosystem: Ubuntu

Description

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

workqueue: Fix selection of wake_cpu in kick_pool()

With cpu_possible_mask=0-63 and cpu_online_mask=0-7 the following
kernel oops was observed:

smp: Bringing up secondary CPUs ...
smp: Brought up 1 node, 8 CPUs
Unable to handle kernel pointer dereference in virtual kernel address space
Failing address: 0000000000000000 TEID: 0000000000000803
[..]
Call Trace:
arch_vcpu_is_preempted+0x12/0x80
select_idle_sibling+0x42/0x560
select_task_rq_fair+0x29a/0x3b0
try_to_wake_up+0x38e/0x6e0
kick_pool+0xa4/0x198
__queue_work.part.0+0x2bc/0x3a8
call_timer_fn+0x36/0x160
__run_timers+0x1e2/0x328
__run_timer_base+0x5a/0x88
run_timer_softirq+0x40/0x78
__do_softirq+0x118/0x388
irq_exit_rcu+0xc0/0xd8
do_ext_irq+0xae/0x168
ext_int_handler+0xbe/0xf0
psw_idle_exit+0x0/0xc
default_idle_call+0x3c/0x110
do_idle+0xd4/0x158
cpu_startup_entry+0x40/0x48
rest_init+0xc6/0xc8
start_kernel+0x3c4/0x5e0
startup_continue+0x3c/0x50

The crash is caused by calling arch_vcpu_is_preempted() for an offline
CPU. To avoid this, select the cpu with cpumask_any_and_distribute()
to mask __pod_cpumask with cpu_online_mask. In case no cpu is left in
the pool, skip the assignment.

tj: This doesn't fully fix the bug as CPUs can still go down between picking
the target CPU and the wake call. Fixing that likely requires adding
cpu_online() test to either the sched or s390 arch code. However, regardless
of how that is fixed, workqueue shouldn't be picking a CPU which isn't
online as that would result in unpredictable and worse behavior.

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
Linux Linux 6.6 6.6.31

Fixed in Linux distributions

Distributions backport fixes, so the version that fixes this vulnerability differs per release — upgrade to at least the version shown. From the distributions' security trackers and advisories.

ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Debian 14 linux 6.8.11-1 —
Debian 13 linux 6.8.11-1 —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux 6.8.0-40.40 USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-aws 6.8.0-1013.14 USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-azure 6.8.0-1012.14 USN-6952-2
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-gcp 6.8.0-1012.13 USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-gke 6.8.0-1008.11 USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-ibm +2 6.8.0-1010.10 USN-6955-1, USN-6952-1, USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-nvidia 6.8.0-1011.11 USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-nvidia-lowlatency 6.8.0-1011.11.1 USN-6952-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-raspi 6.8.0-1009.10 USN-6949-2
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-riscv +1 6.8.0-40.40.1 USN-6949-2
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-aws-6.8 6.8.0-1013.14~22.04.1 —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-azure-6.8 6.8.0-1012.14~22.04.1 —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-gcp-6.8 6.8.0-1012.13~22.04.1 —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-hwe-6.8 6.8.0-40.40~22.04.3 —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-nvidia-6.8 6.8.0-1011.11~22.04.1 USN-6949-1
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-oracle-6.8 6.8.0-1010.10~22.04.1 —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-riscv +22 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-riscv-6.8 +1 6.8.0-40.40.1~22.04.1 —
Ubuntu 20.04 LTS linux-gke +26 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 18.04 LTS linux-gcp +13 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 16.04 LTS linux-hwe-edge No fix yet —
Show 1 more (older releases, extended support, other products)
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu Pro Realtime 24.04 LTS linux-raspi-realtime 6.8.0-2008.8 —
Ubuntu Pro Realtime 24.04 LTS linux-realtime 6.8.1-1006.6 —

Advisories 6

References