CVE-2025-38438
Linux Kernel 5.2 – 6.12.39
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-2025-38438 is a medium-severity Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime (CWE-401) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 5.5 (Medium).
Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Endpoint Denial of Service (T1499); 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-2025-22703
Vulnerability Data
In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ASoC: SOF: Intel: hda: Use devm_kstrdup() to avoid memleak. sof_pdata->tplg_filename can have address allocated by kstrdup() and can be overwritten. Memory leak was detected with kmemleak: unreferenced object 0xffff88812391ff60 (size…
more
16): comm "kworker/4:1", pid 161, jiffies 4294802931 hex dump (first 16 bytes): 73 6f 66 2d 68 64 61 2d 67 65 6e 65 72 69 63 00 sof-hda-generic. backtrace (crc 4bf1675c): __kmalloc_node_track_caller_noprof+0x49c/0x6b0 kstrdup+0x46/0xc0 hda_machine_select.cold+0x1de/0x12cf [snd_sof_intel_hda_generic] sof_init_environment+0x16f/0xb50 [snd_sof] sof_probe_continue+0x45/0x7c0 [snd_sof] sof_probe_work+0x1e/0x40 [snd_sof] process_one_work+0x894/0x14b0 worker_thread+0x5e5/0xfb0 kthread+0x39d/0x760 ret_from_fork+0x31/0x70 ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30
- 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 (static analysis, fuzzing, or runtime leak detection) directly finds missing deallocation.
Requiring documented development standards and tools can mandate memory-management disciplines that avoid leaks at introduction.
Engineering principles applied during development can require explicit resource-release patterns that stop memory leaks from being coded.
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 directly enforce proper memory allocation/deallocation via coding standards, reviews, and tooling.
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 can detect unreleased memory, providing partial coverage of the weakness.
Secure development life cycle mandates memory-management practices that reduce missing-release defects.
Application security requirements can specify explicit memory-release rules, partially mitigating the weakness.
Secure system architecture and engineering principles include resource-management guidelines that address memory leaks.
Secure coding standards directly require proper allocation/deallocation, covering most of this weakness.
Capacity management may detect memory exhaustion symptoms but does not prevent the coding flaw.