Security Resilience

CVE-2023-52698

Linux Kernel 4.8 – 4.19.306

Published
17 May 2024
Modified
07 January 2025
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 5.5
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0022 12th percentile
Risk Priority 42 floored blend · peak EPSS

CVSS and EPSS are reproduced from their sources (NVD, FIRST EPSS). Risk Priority is our own derived reading, not an NVD score.

Summary

CVE-2023-52698 is a medium-severity Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime (CWE-401) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 5.5 (Medium).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Junk Data (T1001.001); ranked at the 12th 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-15 (Development Process, Standards, and Tools) — 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: calipso: fix memory leak in netlbl_calipso_add_pass() If IPv6 support is disabled at boot (ipv6.disable=1), the calipso_init() -> netlbl_calipso_ops_register() function isn't called, and the netlbl_calipso_ops_get() function always returns NULL. In this…

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case, the netlbl_calipso_add_pass() function allocates memory for the doi_def variable but doesn't free it with the calipso_doi_free(). BUG: memory leak unreferenced object 0xffff888011d68180 (size 64): comm "syz-executor.1", pid 10746, jiffies 4295410986 (age 17.928s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): 00 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 ................ backtrace: [<...>] kmalloc include/linux/slab.h:552 [inline] [<...>] netlbl_calipso_add_pass net/netlabel/netlabel_calipso.c:76 [inline] [<...>] netlbl_calipso_add+0x22e/0x4f0 net/netlabel/netlabel_calipso.c:111 [<...>] genl_family_rcv_msg_doit+0x22f/0x330 net/netlink/genetlink.c:739 [<...>] genl_family_rcv_msg net/netlink/genetlink.c:783 [inline] [<...>] genl_rcv_msg+0x341/0x5a0 net/netlink/genetlink.c:800 [<...>] netlink_rcv_skb+0x14d/0x440 net/netlink/af_netlink.c:2515 [<...>] genl_rcv+0x29/0x40 net/netlink/genetlink.c:811 [<...>] netlink_unicast_kernel net/netlink/af_netlink.c:1313 [inline] [<...>] netlink_unicast+0x54b/0x800 net/netlink/af_netlink.c:1339 [<...>] netlink_sendmsg+0x90a/0xdf0 net/netlink/af_netlink.c:1934 [<...>] sock_sendmsg_nosec net/socket.c:651 [inline] [<...>] sock_sendmsg+0x157/0x190 net/socket.c:671 [<...>] ____sys_sendmsg+0x712/0x870 net/socket.c:2342 [<...>] ___sys_sendmsg+0xf8/0x170 net/socket.c:2396 [<...>] __sys_sendmsg+0xea/0x1b0 net/socket.c:2429 [<...>] do_syscall_64+0x30/0x40 arch/x86/entry/common.c:46 [<...>] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x61/0xc6 Found by InfoTeCS on behalf of Linux Verification Center (linuxtesting.org) with Syzkaller [PM: merged via the LSM tree at Jakub Kicinski request]

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1001.001 Junk Data Command And Control
Adversaries may add junk data to protocols used for command and control to make detection more difficult.
T1001.002 Steganography Command And Control
Adversaries may use steganographic techniques to hide command and control traffic to make detection efforts more difficult.
T1001.003 Protocol or Service Impersonation Command And Control
Adversaries may impersonate legitimate protocols or web service traffic to disguise command and control activity and thwart analysis efforts.
T1003 OS Credential Dumping Credential Access
Adversaries may attempt to dump credentials to obtain account login and credential material, normally in the form of a hash or a clear text password.
T1003.001 LSASS Memory Credential Access
Adversaries may attempt to access credential material stored in the process memory of the Local Security Authority Subsystem Service (LSASS).
T1003.004 LSA Secrets Credential Access
Adversaries with SYSTEM access to a host may attempt to access Local Security Authority (LSA) secrets, which can contain a variety of different credential materials, such as credentials for service accounts.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

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Affected Assets

linux
linux kernel
4.8 — 4.19.306 · 4.20 — 5.4.268 · 5.5 — 5.10.209

Mitigating Controls

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

Developer testing and evaluation (static analysis, fuzzing, or runtime leak detection) directly finds missing deallocation.

Requiring documented development standards and tools can mandate memory-management disciplines that avoid leaks at introduction.

Engineering principles applied during development can require explicit resource-release patterns that stop memory leaks from being coded.

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 partial match
blocks

Secure SDLC practices directly enforce proper memory allocation/deallocation via coding standards, reviews, and tooling.

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.

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References