CVE-2025-38054
Linux Kernel 6.9 – 6.12.31
Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:HSummary
CVE-2025-38054 is a medium-severity Use of Uninitialized Resource (CWE-908) 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 5th 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
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2025-18599
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ptp: ocp: Limit signal/freq counts in summary output functions The debugfs summary output could access uninitialized elements in the freq_in[] and signal_out[] arrays, causing NULL pointer dereferences and triggering a…
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kernel Oops (page_fault_oops). This patch adds u8 fields (nr_freq_in, nr_signal_out) to track the number of initialized elements, with a maximum of 4 per array. The summary output functions are updated to respect these limits, preventing out-of-bounds access and ensuring safe array handling. Widen the label variables because the change confuses GCC about max length of the strings.
- CWE(s)
Related Threats
MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques
CVEs Like This One
Affected Assets
Mitigating Controls
Mitigating Controls (NIST 800-53 r5) AI
Developer testing and evaluation (including static analysis) can find uses of uninitialized resources after they are coded.
Requiring documented development standards and tools can mandate initialization checks and safe patterns that stop the weakness from being introduced.
Engineering principles can require explicit resource initialization before use, structurally avoiding uninitialized access.
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 SDLC activities such as static analysis and code review directly prevent use of uninitialized resources while also addressing many other weaknesses.
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 can detect uninitialized resource usage through dynamic analysis and fuzzing.
Secure development life cycle mandates initialization checks and static analysis that can catch uninitialized resource use.
Application security requirements can specify mandatory initialization of variables and resources before use.
Secure system architecture and engineering principles include defensive coding practices that prevent use of uninitialized memory or objects.
Secure coding standards directly require explicit initialization of all variables and resources, substantially mitigating CWE-908.