CVE-2023-52668
Linux Kernel 6.6 – 6.6.15
Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:HCVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.
Summary
CVE-2023-52668 is a medium-severity Improper Locking (CWE-667) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 5.5 (Medium).
Operationally, ranked at the 7th percentile by exploit likelihood (below the median); it is not currently listed in the CISA KEV catalog.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2023-57292
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: btrfs: zoned: fix lock ordering in btrfs_zone_activate() The btrfs CI reported a lockdep warning as follows by running generic generic/129. WARNING: possible circular locking dependency detected 6.7.0-rc5+ #1 Not tainted…
more
------------------------------------------------------ kworker/u5:5/793427 is trying to acquire lock: ffff88813256d028 (&cache->lock){+.+.}-{2:2}, at: btrfs_zone_finish_one_bg+0x5e/0x130 but task is already holding lock: ffff88810a23a318 (&fs_info->zone_active_bgs_lock){+.+.}-{2:2}, at: btrfs_zone_finish_one_bg+0x34/0x130 which lock already depends on the new lock. the existing dependency chain (in reverse order) is: -> #1 (&fs_info->zone_active_bgs_lock){+.+.}-{2:2}: ... -> #0 (&cache->lock){+.+.}-{2:2}: ... This is because we take fs_info->zone_active_bgs_lock after a block_group's lock in btrfs_zone_activate() while doing the opposite in other places. Fix the issue by expanding the fs_info->zone_active_bgs_lock's critical section and taking it before a block_group's lock.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
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.
Secure development lifecycle includes concurrency and locking requirements that reduce improper locking defects.
A.8.26 only requires that security requirements (including resilience against attacks such as buffer overflows or SQL injection) be identified and specified during development or acquisition; it does not itself enforce, implement, or prevent improper locking from being present or exploitable in the resulting application.
Secure architecture principles address thread-safety and resource synchronization.
Secure coding standards directly prohibit missing or incorrect lock usage.
Security testing can detect race conditions and locking errors before release.
Change management may catch locking issues introduced by modifications but does not prevent the weakness itself.
Hardening callouts derived
DISA STIG baselines are authored against specific weaknesses. Where this CVE cites a broad weakness class, the mapping is not asserted at that abstraction (owner ruling, 2026-09-25: grade only at Base and below), so no rule is shown here rather than a rule shown against the wrong grain.
- No fine-grained STIG row for CWE-667, a class-level weakness, and none of its children carries one either.