Vulnerability in Kernel (CVE-2023-53709)

Summary

Vulnerability in Kernel (CVE-2023-53709). Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure. Mitigation: upgrade to 5.10.173, 5.15.99, 6.1.16, 6.2.3 or later.

Original description

The description as published by the source.

In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved:

ring-buffer: Handle race between rb_move_tail and rb_check_pages

It seems a data race between ring_buffer writing and integrity check.
That is, RB_FLAG of head_page is been updating, while at same time
RB_FLAG was cleared when doing integrity check rb_check_pages():

rb_check_pages() rb_handle_head_page():

rb_head_page_deactivate()
rb_head_page_set_normal()
rb_head_page_activate()

We do intergrity test of the list to check if the list is corrupted and
it is still worth doing it. So, let's refactor rb_check_pages() such that
we no longer clear and set flag during the list sanity checking.

[1] and [2] are the test to reproduce and the crash report respectively.

1:

  while true;
  do
    # the "trace" file is closed after read
    head -1 /sys/kernel/tracing/trace > /dev/null
  done

  sysctl -w kernel.panic_on_warn=1
  # function tracer will writing enough data into ring_buffer
  echo function > /sys/kernel/tracing/current_tracer
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &
  ./read_trace.sh &

2:
------------[ cut here ]------------
WARNING: CPU: 9 PID: 62 at kernel/trace/ring_buffer.c:2653
rb_move_tail+0x450/0x470
Modules linked in:
CPU: 9 PID: 62 Comm: ksoftirqd/9 Tainted: G W…

Source: OSV.dev (Open Source Vulnerabilities) NVD OSV

Auto-generated summary

Assembled by SecPulse from the source data (CVSS, CWE, affected versions) using templates — no AI involved. Check the original description and references below for exact details.

A vulnerability tracked as CVE-2023-53709 has been found in Kernel.
Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure.
What to do: upgrade Kernel to 5.10.173, 5.15.99, 6.1.16, 6.2.3 or later.
If unsure, ask your IT team or search "Kernel CVE-2023-53709" on the vendor's site.

CVE-2023-53709 (Kernel)
Patched: 5.10.173, 5.15.99, 6.1.16, 6.2.3 — apply immediately
Plan: 1) Audit SBOM/dependencies, 2) Stage→prod upgrade, 3) Add WAF/proxy monitoring on affected endpoints, 4) Hunt IOCs in logs.
Refs: see the GHSA / vendor advisory / patched release linked on this page.

❓ What is the problem

A vulnerability (unclassified) exists in Kernel.

📍 Affected scope

Check the vendor advisory for the affected versions of Kernel.

🔥 Severity

Severity: ?. Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure.

🔧 How to fix

Update to 5.10.173, 5.15.99, 6.1.16, 6.2.3.

🛡️ Workaround

Until the patch is applied: disable the affected feature, apply WAF rules, or restrict access via network ACLs.

🔍 Detection

Search webserver/proxy logs for unusual request patterns matching this CVE's known IOCs. Run grep -r 'Kernel' . against your dependency files (package-lock.json, requirements.txt, go.sum) to find affected services.

Response actions

Concrete steps and command examples for SOC/SRE teams to execute in order

1
Identify exposure identify
```
grep -r 'Kernel' . | grep -v node_modules
```
リポジトリと本番環境の依存ファイル (package-lock.json / requirements.txt / go.sum / Gemfile.lock 等) で Kernel を grep し、稼働しているサービス・バージョンを把握する。
2
Apply patch patch
```
Upgrade Kernel to 5.10.173, 5.15.99, 6.1.16, 6.2.3
```
ステージング環境で 5.10.173, 5.15.99, 6.1.16, 6.2.3 に上げて回帰テスト → 本番反映。回帰テストはアプリの主要ハッピーパスを含めること。
3
Post-deployment verification verify
```
Confirm patched version is live in production
```
パッチ適用後、ステージングで PoC または同等の悪用パターンを再現して脆弱性が閉じたことを確認。本番ではアクセスログ・WAF でアラート再発が無いか継続監視。

Affected packages

Linux Kernel

[{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"5.7.0"},{"fixed":"5.10.173"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"5.11.0"},{"fixed":"5.15.99"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"5.16.0"},{"fixed":"6.1.16"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"6.2.0"},{"fixed":"6.2.3"}]}]

Fix status by distribution

Fixed packages published by each distribution for this CVE

Debian DEBIAN-CVE-2023-53709 linux Fixed in: 5.10.178-1
Ubuntu UBUNTU-CVE-2023-53709 linux