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-2023-52803 is a medium-severity Use After Free (CWE-416) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 5.5 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique OS Credential Dumping (T1003); ranked at the 14th 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
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2023-59520
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: SUNRPC: Fix RPC client cleaned up the freed pipefs dentries RPC client pipefs dentries cleanup is in separated rpc_remove_pipedir() workqueue,which takes care about pipefs superblock locking. In some special scenarios,…
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when kernel frees the pipefs sb of the current client and immediately alloctes a new pipefs sb, rpc_remove_pipedir function would misjudge the existence of pipefs sb which is not the one it used to hold. As a result, the rpc_remove_pipedir would clean the released freed pipefs dentries. To fix this issue, rpc_remove_pipedir should check whether the current pipefs sb is consistent with the original pipefs sb. This error can be catched by KASAN: ========================================================= [ 250.497700] BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in dget_parent+0x195/0x200 [ 250.498315] Read of size 4 at addr ffff88800a2ab804 by task kworker/0:18/106503 [ 250.500549] Workqueue: events rpc_free_client_work [ 250.501001] Call Trace: [ 250.502880] kasan_report+0xb6/0xf0 [ 250.503209] ? dget_parent+0x195/0x200 [ 250.503561] dget_parent+0x195/0x200 [ 250.503897] ? __pfx_rpc_clntdir_depopulate+0x10/0x10 [ 250.504384] rpc_rmdir_depopulate+0x1b/0x90 [ 250.504781] rpc_remove_client_dir+0xf5/0x150 [ 250.505195] rpc_free_client_work+0xe4/0x230 [ 250.505598] process_one_work+0x8ee/0x13b0 ... [ 22.039056] Allocated by task 244: [ 22.039390] kasan_save_stack+0x22/0x50 [ 22.039758] kasan_set_track+0x25/0x30 [ 22.040109] __kasan_slab_alloc+0x59/0x70 [ 22.040487] kmem_cache_alloc_lru+0xf0/0x240 [ 22.040889] __d_alloc+0x31/0x8e0 [ 22.041207] d_alloc+0x44/0x1f0 [ 22.041514] __rpc_lookup_create_exclusive+0x11c/0x140 [ 22.041987] rpc_mkdir_populate.constprop.0+0x5f/0x110 [ 22.042459] rpc_create_client_dir+0x34/0x150 [ 22.042874] rpc_setup_pipedir_sb+0x102/0x1c0 [ 22.043284] rpc_client_register+0x136/0x4e0 [ 22.043689] rpc_new_client+0x911/0x1020 [ 22.044057] rpc_create_xprt+0xcb/0x370 [ 22.044417] rpc_create+0x36b/0x6c0 ... [ 22.049524] Freed by task 0: [ 22.049803] kasan_save_stack+0x22/0x50 [ 22.050165] kasan_set_track+0x25/0x30 [ 22.050520] kasan_save_free_info+0x2b/0x50 [ 22.050921] __kasan_slab_free+0x10e/0x1a0 [ 22.051306] kmem_cache_free+0xa5/0x390 [ 22.051667] rcu_core+0x62c/0x1930 [ 22.051995] __do_softirq+0x165/0x52a [ 22.052347] [ 22.052503] Last potentially related work creation: [ 22.052952] kasan_save_stack+0x22/0x50 [ 22.053313] __kasan_record_aux_stack+0x8e/0xa0 [ 22.053739] __call_rcu_common.constprop.0+0x6b/0x8b0 [ 22.054209] dentry_free+0xb2/0x140 [ 22.054540] __dentry_kill+0x3be/0x540 [ 22.054900] shrink_dentry_list+0x199/0x510 [ 22.055293] shrink_dcache_parent+0x190/0x240 [ 22.055703] do_one_tree+0x11/0x40 [ 22.056028] shrink_dcache_for_umount+0x61/0x140 [ 22.056461] generic_shutdown_super+0x70/0x590 [ 22.056879] kill_anon_super+0x3a/0x60 [ 22.057234] rpc_kill_sb+0x121/0x200
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
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- 3 hardening rules · 3 OS baselines
V1.4.3
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Developer testing and evaluation can discover use-after-free bugs through dynamic analysis or fuzzing.
Engineering principles can require memory-safe constructs or languages that structurally avoid introducing use-after-free.
Process isolation confines the blast radius of use-after-free memory corruption to a single execution domain.
Memory protection controls limit exploitation impact by blocking unauthorized code execution from dangling pointers.
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.
Vulnerability identification processes can discover use-after-free issues via scanning or analysis but do not prevent their introduction.
Routine patching removes known use-after-free instances after they have been introduced in released software.
Secure SDLC practices directly incorporate memory-safety tooling and reviews that prevent most use-after-free defects.
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.
Hardening callouts derived
Configuration rules from DISA STIG baselines that bear on weaknesses of the type cited by this CVE. Each rule is shown with the relationship its mapping actually records, against the CWE it was authored against. Derived via CVE→CWE over `controls_xwalks` (higher-evidence rows only; rows rated `none` are excluded).
Oracle Linux 8 (1 rule)
- V-248592 OL 8 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. blocks CWE-416
RHEL 8 (1 rule)
- V-230279 RHEL 8 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. blocks CWE-416
RHEL 9 (1 rule)
- V-257794 RHEL 9 must clear memory when it is freed to prevent use-after-free attacks. blocks CWE-416