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High · 7.8 CVE-2024-43891 EUVD-2024-40541GHSA-392h-pcr9-7j4w

tracing: Have format file honor EVENT_FILE_FL_FREED

Published Aug 26, 2024 · Updated Aug 5, 2026 · Assigned by Linux

Vendor: Linux Product: Linux Package: kernel 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-6.5 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-6.5 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-6.5 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 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-6.5 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-6.5 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-6.5 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-6.5 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-6.5 Package: linux-riscv-6.8 Package: linux-starfive-5.19 Package: linux-starfive-6.2 Package: linux-starfive-6.5 Platform: Linux Ecosystem: Azure Linux Ecosystem: Debian Ecosystem: Ubuntu

Description

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

tracing: Have format file honor EVENT_FILE_FL_FREED

When eventfs was introduced, special care had to be done to coordinate the
freeing of the file meta data with the files that are exposed to user
space. The file meta data would have a ref count that is set when the file
is created and would be decremented and freed after the last user that
opened the file closed it. When the file meta data was to be freed, it
would set a flag (EVENT_FILE_FL_FREED) to denote that the file is freed,
and any new references made (like new opens or reads) would fail as it is
marked freed. This allowed other meta data to be freed after this flag was
set (under the event_mutex).

All the files that were dynamically created in the events directory had a
pointer to the file meta data and would call event_release() when the last
reference to the user space file was closed. This would be the time that it
is safe to free the file meta data.

A shortcut was made for the "format" file. It's i_private would point to
the "call" entry directly and not point to the file's meta data. This is
because all format files are the same for the same "call", so it was
thought there was no reason to differentiate them. The other files
maintain state (like the "enable", "trigger", etc). But this meant if the
file were to disappear, the "format" file would be unaware of it.

This caused a race that could be trigger via the user_events test (that
would create dynamic events and free them), and running a loop that would
read the user_events format files:

In one console run:

# cd tools/testing/selftests/user_events
# while true; do ./ftrace_test; done

And in another console run:

# cd /sys/kernel/tracing/
# while true; do cat events/user_events/__test_event/format; done 2>/dev/null

With KASAN memory checking, it would trigger a use-after-free bug report
(which was a real bug). This was because the format file was not checking
the file's meta data flag "EVENT_FILE_FL_FREED", so it would access the
event that the file meta data pointed to after the event was freed.

After inspection, there are other locations that were found to not check
the EVENT_FILE_FL_FREED flag when accessing the trace_event_file. Add a
new helper function: event_file_file() that will make sure that the
event_mutex is held, and will return NULL if the trace_event_file has the
EVENT_FILE_FL_FREED flag set. Have the first reference of the struct file
pointer use event_file_file() and check for NULL. Later uses can still use
the event_file_data() helper function if the event_mutex is still held and
was not released since the event_file_file() call.

Affected products

VendorProductAffectedFixed
Linux Linux 6.6.33 – < 6.6.49, 6.9 6.6.49

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 6.10.6-1 —
Debian 13 linux 6.10.6-1 —
ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux 6.8.0-50.51 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-aws 6.8.0-1020.22 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-azure 6.8.0-1020.23 USN-7196-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-gcp +1 6.8.0-1019.21 USN-7155-1, USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-gke 6.8.0-1015.19 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-gkeop 6.8.0-1002.4 USN-7156-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-ibm 6.8.0-1017.17 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-nvidia-lowlatency 6.8.0-1019.21.1 USN-7155-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-oem-6.8 6.8.0-1018.18 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-oracle 6.8.0-1017.18 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-raspi 6.8.0-1016.18 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS linux-riscv +1 6.8.0-50.51.1 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-aws-6.8 6.8.0-1020.22~22.04.1 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-azure-6.8 6.8.0-1020.23~22.04.1 USN-7196-1
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-gcp-6.8 +1 6.8.0-1019.21~22.04.1 USN-7155-1, USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-hwe-6.8 6.8.0-50.51~22.04.1 USN-7154-2
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-oracle-6.8 6.8.0-1017.18~22.04.1 USN-7154-1
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-riscv +31 No fix yet —
Ubuntu 22.04 LTS linux-riscv-6.8 +1 6.8.0-50.51.1~22.04.1 USN-7154-1
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 6.8.0-2015.16 —
Ubuntu Pro Realtime 24.04 LTS linux-realtime 6.8.1-1013.14 —

Azure Linux

ReleasePackageFixed inAdvisory
Azure Linux 3 kernel 6.6.51.1-1 —

Advisories 6

References