Cyber Resilience

CVE-2024-50221

Memory Safety in Linux Kernel 6.6 – 6.11.7

Published
09 November 2024
Modified
11 December 2024
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 56 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-2024-50221 is a high-severity Out-of-bounds Write (CWE-787) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 7.8 (High).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Privilege Escalation (T1068); 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-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: drm/amd/pm: Vangogh: Fix kernel memory out of bounds write KASAN reports that the GPU metrics table allocated in vangogh_tables_init() is not large enough for the memset done in smu_cmn_init_soft_gpu_metrics(). Condensed…

more

report follows: [ 33.861314] BUG: KASAN: slab-out-of-bounds in smu_cmn_init_soft_gpu_metrics+0x73/0x200 [amdgpu] [ 33.861799] Write of size 168 at addr ffff888129f59500 by task mangoapp/1067 ... [ 33.861808] CPU: 6 UID: 1000 PID: 1067 Comm: mangoapp Tainted: G W 6.12.0-rc4 #356 1a56f59a8b5182eeaf67eb7cb8b13594dd23b544 [ 33.861816] Tainted: [W]=WARN [ 33.861818] Hardware name: Valve Galileo/Galileo, BIOS F7G0107 12/01/2023 [ 33.861822] Call Trace: [ 33.861826] <TASK> [ 33.861829] dump_stack_lvl+0x66/0x90 [ 33.861838] print_report+0xce/0x620 [ 33.861853] kasan_report+0xda/0x110 [ 33.862794] kasan_check_range+0xfd/0x1a0 [ 33.862799] __asan_memset+0x23/0x40 [ 33.862803] smu_cmn_init_soft_gpu_metrics+0x73/0x200 [amdgpu 13b1bc364ec578808f676eba412c20eaab792779] [ 33.863306] vangogh_get_gpu_metrics_v2_4+0x123/0xad0 [amdgpu 13b1bc364ec578808f676eba412c20eaab792779] [ 33.864257] vangogh_common_get_gpu_metrics+0xb0c/0xbc0 [amdgpu 13b1bc364ec578808f676eba412c20eaab792779] [ 33.865682] amdgpu_dpm_get_gpu_metrics+0xcc/0x110 [amdgpu 13b1bc364ec578808f676eba412c20eaab792779] [ 33.866160] amdgpu_get_gpu_metrics+0x154/0x2d0 [amdgpu 13b1bc364ec578808f676eba412c20eaab792779] [ 33.867135] dev_attr_show+0x43/0xc0 [ 33.867147] sysfs_kf_seq_show+0x1f1/0x3b0 [ 33.867155] seq_read_iter+0x3f8/0x1140 [ 33.867173] vfs_read+0x76c/0xc50 [ 33.867198] ksys_read+0xfb/0x1d0 [ 33.867214] do_syscall_64+0x90/0x160 ... [ 33.867353] Allocated by task 378 on cpu 7 at 22.794876s: [ 33.867358] kasan_save_stack+0x33/0x50 [ 33.867364] kasan_save_track+0x17/0x60 [ 33.867367] __kasan_kmalloc+0x87/0x90 [ 33.867371] vangogh_init_smc_tables+0x3f9/0x840 [amdgpu] [ 33.867835] smu_sw_init+0xa32/0x1850 [amdgpu] [ 33.868299] amdgpu_device_init+0x467b/0x8d90 [amdgpu] [ 33.868733] amdgpu_driver_load_kms+0x19/0xf0 [amdgpu] [ 33.869167] amdgpu_pci_probe+0x2d6/0xcd0 [amdgpu] [ 33.869608] local_pci_probe+0xda/0x180 [ 33.869614] pci_device_probe+0x43f/0x6b0 Empirically we can confirm that the former allocates 152 bytes for the table, while the latter memsets the 168 large block. Root cause appears that when GPU metrics tables for v2_4 parts were added it was not considered to enlarge the table to fit. The fix in this patch is rather "brute force" and perhaps later should be done in a smarter way, by extracting and consolidating the part version to size logic to a common helper, instead of brute forcing the largest possible allocation. Nevertheless, for now this works and fixes the out of bounds write. v2: * Drop impossible v3_0 case. (Mario) (cherry picked from commit 0880f58f9609f0200483a49429af0f050d281703)

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1068 Exploitation for Privilege Escalation Privilege Escalation
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to elevate privileges.
T1190 Exploit Public-Facing Application Initial Access
Adversaries may attempt to exploit a weakness in an Internet-facing host or system to initially access a network.
T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution Execution
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in client applications to execute code.
T1210 Exploitation of Remote Services Lateral Movement
Adversaries may exploit remote services to gain unauthorized access to internal systems once inside of a network.
T1211 Exploitation for Stealth Stealth
Adversaries may exploit vulnerabilities to evade detection by hiding activity, suppressing logging, or operating within trusted or unmonitored components.
T1212 Exploitation for Credential Access Credential Access
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities in an attempt to collect credentials.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

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CVE-2025-37944Same product: Linux Linux Kernel
CVE-2023-52836Same product: Linux Linux Kernel
CVE-2025-21914Same product: Linux Linux Kernel
CVE-2024-35797Same product: Linux Linux Kernel
CVE-2023-52868Same product: Linux Linux Kernel
CVE-2024-53193Same product: Linux Linux Kernel

Affected Assets

linux
linux kernel
6.12 · 6.6 — 6.11.7

Mitigating Controls

Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI

Developer testing and evaluation (including fuzzing and bounds checks) finds out-of-bounds write flaws before deployment.

Requiring documented secure-development standards and tools can mandate bounds-checked coding practices that avoid the weakness.

Input validation can structurally reject or sanitize data that would otherwise trigger an out-of-bounds write.

Memory-protection mechanisms limit the exploitability and blast radius of a successful out-of-bounds write.

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-development practices (static analysis, bounds checking, code review) are the primary means of preventing out-of-bounds writes.

ID.RA-01 partial match
prevents

Vulnerability scanning and recording can discover out-of-bounds write flaws so they can be remediated.

PR.PS-02 partial match
prevents

Patching or replacing vulnerable software directly eliminates known instances of this coding weakness.

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 and acceptance can detect and prevent out-of-bounds write defects.

prevents

Secure development life cycle mandates practices that prevent out-of-bounds writes.

prevents

Application security requirements can specify bounds-checking and safe memory handling.

prevents

Secure architecture and engineering principles reduce the likelihood of buffer overflows.

prevents

Secure coding directly addresses out-of-bounds writes through language choice and coding standards.

prevents

Change management can enforce review gates that catch unsafe memory operations before deployment.

References