Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:HSummary
CVE-2025-37785 is a high-severity Out-of-bounds Read (CWE-125) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 7.1 (High).
Operationally, ranked at the 17th 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 SI-10 (Information Input Validation) and SI-16 (Memory Protection) — see the control section below for these in your framework.
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2025-11831
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ext4: fix OOB read when checking dotdot dir Mounting a corrupted filesystem with directory which contains '.' dir entry with rec_len == block size results in out-of-bounds read (later on,…
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when the corrupted directory is removed). ext4_empty_dir() assumes every ext4 directory contains at least '.' and '..' as directory entries in the first data block. It first loads the '.' dir entry, performs sanity checks by calling ext4_check_dir_entry() and then uses its rec_len member to compute the location of '..' dir entry (in ext4_next_entry). It assumes the '..' dir entry fits into the same data block. If the rec_len of '.' is precisely one block (4KB), it slips through the sanity checks (it is considered the last directory entry in the data block) and leaves "struct ext4_dir_entry_2 *de" point exactly past the memory slot allocated to the data block. The following call to ext4_check_dir_entry() on new value of de then dereferences this pointer which results in out-of-bounds mem access. Fix this by extending __ext4_check_dir_entry() to check for '.' dir entries that reach the end of data block. Make sure to ignore the phony dir entries for checksum (by checking name_len for non-zero). Note: This is reported by KASAN as use-after-free in case another structure was recently freed from the slot past the bound, but it is really an OOB read. This issue was found by syzkaller tool. Call Trace: [ 38.594108] BUG: KASAN: slab-use-after-free in __ext4_check_dir_entry+0x67e/0x710 [ 38.594649] Read of size 2 at addr ffff88802b41a004 by task syz-executor/5375 [ 38.595158] [ 38.595288] CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 5375 Comm: syz-executor Not tainted 6.14.0-rc7 #1 [ 38.595298] Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (i440FX + PIIX, 1996), BIOS rel-1.16.3-0-ga6ed6b701f0a-prebuilt.qemu.org 04/01/2014 [ 38.595304] Call Trace: [ 38.595308] <TASK> [ 38.595311] dump_stack_lvl+0xa7/0xd0 [ 38.595325] print_address_description.constprop.0+0x2c/0x3f0 [ 38.595339] ? __ext4_check_dir_entry+0x67e/0x710 [ 38.595349] print_report+0xaa/0x250 [ 38.595359] ? __ext4_check_dir_entry+0x67e/0x710 [ 38.595368] ? kasan_addr_to_slab+0x9/0x90 [ 38.595378] kasan_report+0xab/0xe0 [ 38.595389] ? __ext4_check_dir_entry+0x67e/0x710 [ 38.595400] __ext4_check_dir_entry+0x67e/0x710 [ 38.595410] ext4_empty_dir+0x465/0x990 [ 38.595421] ? __pfx_ext4_empty_dir+0x10/0x10 [ 38.595432] ext4_rmdir.part.0+0x29a/0xd10 [ 38.595441] ? __dquot_initialize+0x2a7/0xbf0 [ 38.595455] ? __pfx_ext4_rmdir.part.0+0x10/0x10 [ 38.595464] ? __pfx___dquot_initialize+0x10/0x10 [ 38.595478] ? down_write+0xdb/0x140 [ 38.595487] ? __pfx_down_write+0x10/0x10 [ 38.595497] ext4_rmdir+0xee/0x140 [ 38.595506] vfs_rmdir+0x209/0x670 [ 38.595517] ? lookup_one_qstr_excl+0x3b/0x190 [ 38.595529] do_rmdir+0x363/0x3c0 [ 38.595537] ? __pfx_do_rmdir+0x10/0x10 [ 38.595544] ? strncpy_from_user+0x1ff/0x2e0 [ 38.595561] __x64_sys_unlinkat+0xf0/0x130 [ 38.595570] do_syscall_64+0x5b/0x180 [ 38.595583] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Control response
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Directly enforces validation of untrusted ext4 directory entries (rec_len, name_len, block bounds) before pointer arithmetic in ext4_empty_dir().
Hardware or kernel memory-protection features (e.g., KASAN-equivalent bounds checking, SMAP) can detect or block the resulting out-of-bounds read.
Requires integrity verification of filesystem metadata on mount, which would reject the malformed '.' entry before the vulnerable code path executes.
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.
Secure-development practices such as bounds checking and memory-safe languages directly prevent out-of-bounds reads.
Vulnerability scanning and recording can discover instances of out-of-bounds reads after code is deployed.
Routine patching replaces vulnerable code containing out-of-bounds read flaws.
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.
Security testing in development and acceptance includes fuzzing and static analysis that detect out-of-bounds read defects before release.
Logging can record evidence of an out-of-bounds read but does not prevent the weakness itself.
Secure development life cycle mandates input validation and bounds checking that directly prevent out-of-bounds reads.
Application security requirements include explicit bounds and memory-safety specifications that mitigate buffer over-reads.
Secure system architecture and engineering principles require memory-safe design patterns and runtime protections against out-of-bounds access.
Secure coding standards explicitly forbid unsafe pointer arithmetic and mandate bounds-checked reads, eliminating CWE-125.