Cyber Resilience

CVE-2023-52621

Linux Kernel 5.10 – 5.10.237

Published
26 March 2024
Modified
25 November 2025
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 7.8
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0024 15th percentile
Risk Priority 55 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2023-52621 is a high-severity Reachable Assertion (CWE-617) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 7.8 (High).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Application or System Exploitation (T1499.004); ranked at the 15th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.

The strongest mitigations our analysis identified map to SA-11 (Developer Testing and Evaluation) and SA-8 (Security and Privacy Engineering Principles) — see the control section below for these in your framework.

EU & UK References

Vulnerability Data

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: bpf: Check rcu_read_lock_trace_held() before calling bpf map helpers These three bpf_map_{lookup,update,delete}_elem() helpers are also available for sleepable bpf program, so add the corresponding lock assertion for sleepable bpf program, otherwise…

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the following warning will be reported when a sleepable bpf program manipulates bpf map under interpreter mode (aka bpf_jit_enable=0): WARNING: CPU: 3 PID: 4985 at kernel/bpf/helpers.c:40 ...... CPU: 3 PID: 4985 Comm: test_progs Not tainted 6.6.0+ #2 Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996) ...... RIP: 0010:bpf_map_lookup_elem+0x54/0x60 ...... Call Trace: <TASK> ? __warn+0xa5/0x240 ? bpf_map_lookup_elem+0x54/0x60 ? report_bug+0x1ba/0x1f0 ? handle_bug+0x40/0x80 ? exc_invalid_op+0x18/0x50 ? asm_exc_invalid_op+0x1b/0x20 ? __pfx_bpf_map_lookup_elem+0x10/0x10 ? rcu_lockdep_current_cpu_online+0x65/0xb0 ? rcu_is_watching+0x23/0x50 ? bpf_map_lookup_elem+0x54/0x60 ? __pfx_bpf_map_lookup_elem+0x10/0x10 ___bpf_prog_run+0x513/0x3b70 __bpf_prog_run32+0x9d/0xd0 ? __bpf_prog_enter_sleepable_recur+0xad/0x120 ? __bpf_prog_enter_sleepable_recur+0x3e/0x120 bpf_trampoline_6442580665+0x4d/0x1000 __x64_sys_getpgid+0x5/0x30 ? do_syscall_64+0x36/0xb0 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x6e/0x76 </TASK>

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1499.004 Application or System Exploitation Impact
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities that can cause an application or system to crash and deny availability to users.
T1499 Endpoint Denial of Service Impact
Adversaries may perform Endpoint Denial of Service (DoS) attacks to degrade or block the availability of services to users.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

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CVE-2025-38712Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2024-26937Same product: Debian Debian Linux

Affected Assets

debian
debian linux
11.0
linux
linux kernel
5.10 — 5.10.237 · 5.11 — 5.15.181 · 5.16 — 6.1.77

Mitigating Controls

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

Developer testing and evaluation finds reachable assertions during development.

Security engineering principles discourage use of assertions for handling untrusted input.

Validating untrusted inputs structurally prevents attacker data from reaching and triggering assertions.

Mitigating Controls (NIST CSF 2.0) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→CSF cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

PR.PS-06 mostly match
prevents

Secure SDLC practices directly prevent unsafe assertions from being coded in reachable paths.

DE.CM-09 partial match
prevents

Runtime monitoring of software can detect assertion-triggered crashes as adverse events.

ID.RA-01 partial match
prevents

Vulnerability identification processes can discover and record reachable-assertion flaws before deployment.

Mitigating Controls (ISO/IEC 27001:2022 Annex A) AI

Derived directly from the weakness types (CWEs) cited in the NVD entry via our AI-authored CWE→ISO cross-walk (authority under review) — links open the control.

finds

Security testing in development can detect reachable assertions before release, reducing the likelihood of exploitation.

prevents

Secure development lifecycle mandates defensive coding and input validation that prevent reachable assertions from being triggered by untrusted data.

prevents

Application security requirements can specify that assertions must not be reachable from attacker-controlled inputs.

prevents

Secure architecture principles discourage the use of assertions for runtime error handling that an attacker could exploit.

prevents

Secure coding standards explicitly ban the use of assert() or equivalent statements that can be triggered by external input.

References