Cyber Resilience

CVE-2025-39857

Memory Safety in Linux Kernel 6.0 – 6.1.151

Published
19 September 2025
Modified
30 July 2026
Patch / advisory
CVSS Score v3.1 7.5
Click a component to see what it means
Raw vectorCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
EPSS Score 0.0029 21th percentile
Risk Priority 56 floored blend · peak EPSS

Summary

CVE-2025-39857 is a high-severity NULL Pointer Dereference (CWE-476) vulnerability in Linux Linux Kernel. Its CVSS base score is 7.5 (High).

Operationally, exploitation aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK technique Endpoint Denial of Service (T1499); ranked at the 21th 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

Vulnerability Data

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: net/smc: fix one NULL pointer dereference in smc_ib_is_sg_need_sync() BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 00000000000002ec PGD 0 P4D 0 Oops: Oops: 0000 [#1] SMP PTI CPU: 28 UID: 0 PID:…

more

343 Comm: kworker/28:1 Kdump: loaded Tainted: G OE 6.17.0-rc2+ #9 NONE Tainted: [O]=OOT_MODULE, [E]=UNSIGNED_MODULE Hardware name: QEMU Standard PC (Q35 + ICH9, 2009), BIOS 1.15.0-1 04/01/2014 Workqueue: smc_hs_wq smc_listen_work [smc] RIP: 0010:smc_ib_is_sg_need_sync+0x9e/0xd0 [smc] ... Call Trace: <TASK> smcr_buf_map_link+0x211/0x2a0 [smc] __smc_buf_create+0x522/0x970 [smc] smc_buf_create+0x3a/0x110 [smc] smc_find_rdma_v2_device_serv+0x18f/0x240 [smc] ? smc_vlan_by_tcpsk+0x7e/0xe0 [smc] smc_listen_find_device+0x1dd/0x2b0 [smc] smc_listen_work+0x30f/0x580 [smc] process_one_work+0x18c/0x340 worker_thread+0x242/0x360 kthread+0xe7/0x220 ret_from_fork+0x13a/0x160 ret_from_fork_asm+0x1a/0x30 </TASK> If the software RoCE device is used, ibdev->dma_device is a null pointer. As a result, the problem occurs. Null pointer detection is added to prevent problems.

CWE(s)

Related Threats

MITRE ATT&CK Enterprise Techniques

T1499 Endpoint Denial of Service Impact
Adversaries may perform Endpoint Denial of Service (DoS) attacks to degrade or block the availability of services to users.
T1499.004 Application or System Exploitation Impact
Adversaries may exploit software vulnerabilities that can cause an application or system to crash and deny availability to users.
T1489 Service Stop Impact
Adversaries may stop or disable services on a system to render those services unavailable to legitimate users.
Derived from this CVE’s CWE(s) via the direct CWE→ATT&CK cross-walk.

CVEs Like This One

CVE-2025-38203Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-39920Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-23145Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-38683Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-38034Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-38337Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2024-36941Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-39902Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2024-26744Same product: Debian Debian Linux
CVE-2025-37938Same product: Debian Debian Linux

Affected Assets

linux
linux kernel
6.17 · 6.0 — 6.1.151 · 6.2 — 6.6.105 · 6.7 — 6.12.46
debian
debian linux
11.0

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.

PR.PS-06 mostly match
prevents

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.

finds

Security testing can detect NULL dereference defects before release.

prevents

Secure SDLC mandates defensive coding practices that can prevent NULL dereferences.

prevents

Application security requirements can specify input validation and pointer-safety rules.

prevents

Secure architecture principles encourage defensive design that avoids unsafe pointer use.

prevents

Secure coding standards directly require NULL-pointer checks and safe dereference patterns.

References