Raw vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:L/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-2025-38197 is a high-severity NULL Pointer Dereference (CWE-476) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 7.3 (High).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Exploitation for Client Execution (T1203); ranked at the 9th 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.
OWASP Top 10 for Web (2025)
EU & UK References
- 🇪🇺 ENISA EUVD: EUVD-2025-20059
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: platform/x86: dell_rbu: Fix list usage Pass the correct list head to list_for_each_entry*() when looping through the packet list. Without this patch, reading the packet data via sysfs will show the…
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data incorrectly (because it starts at the wrong packet), and clearing the packet list will result in a NULL pointer dereference.
- 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) directly finds null-dereference bugs before deployment.
Documented development standards and tools can enforce null-safety rules and safe pointer usage.
Engineering principles can mandate defensive coding such as explicit null checks before dereference.
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 practices (static analysis, code review, safe coding standards) directly prevent NULL dereference bugs during development.
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 can detect NULL dereference defects before release.
Secure coding standards directly require NULL-pointer checks and safe dereference patterns.