Vulnerability in Kernel (CVE-2025-38650)

Summary

Vulnerability in Kernel (CVE-2025-38650). Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure. Mitigation: upgrade to 5.4.297, 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.148, 6.6.102, 6.12.42, 6.15.10, 6.16.1 or later.

Original description

The description as published by the source.

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

hfsplus: remove mutex_lock check in hfsplus_free_extents

Syzbot reported an issue in hfsplus filesystem:

------------[ cut here ]------------
WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: 4400 at fs/hfsplus/extents.c:346
hfsplus_free_extents+0x700/0xad0
Call Trace:

hfsplus_file_truncate+0x768/0xbb0 fs/hfsplus/extents.c:606
hfsplus_write_begin+0xc2/0xd0 fs/hfsplus/inode.c:56
cont_expand_zero fs/buffer.c:2383 [inline]
cont_write_begin+0x2cf/0x860 fs/buffer.c:2446
hfsplus_write_begin+0x86/0xd0 fs/hfsplus/inode.c:52
generic_cont_expand_simple+0x151/0x250 fs/buffer.c:2347
hfsplus_setattr+0x168/0x280 fs/hfsplus/inode.c:263
notify_change+0xe38/0x10f0 fs/attr.c:420
do_truncate+0x1fb/0x2e0 fs/open.c:65
do_sys_ftruncate+0x2eb/0x380 fs/open.c:193
do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:50 [inline]
do_syscall_64+0x3d/0xb0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:80
entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x63/0xcd

To avoid deadlock, Commit 31651c607151 ("hfsplus: avoid deadlock
on file truncation") unlock extree before hfsplus_free_extents(),
and add check wheather extree is locked in hfsplus_free_extents().

However, when operations such as hfsplus_file_release,
hfsplus_setattr, hfsplus_unlink, and hfsplus_get_block are executed
concurrently in different files, it is very likely to trigger the
WARN_ON, which will lead syzbot and xfstest to consider it as an
abnormality.

The comment above this warning also describes one of the easy
triggering situations, which can…

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-2025-38650 has been found in Kernel.
Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure.
What to do: upgrade Kernel to 5.4.297, 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.148, 6.6.102, 6.12.42, 6.15.10, 6.16.1 or later.
If unsure, ask your IT team or search "Kernel CVE-2025-38650" on the vendor's site.

CVE-2025-38650 (Kernel)
Patched: 5.4.297, 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.148, 6.6.102, 6.12.42, 6.15.10, 6.16.1 — 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 5.4.297, 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.148, 6.6.102, 6.12.42, 6.15.10, 6.16.1.

🛡️ 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 5.4.297, 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.148, 6.6.102, 6.12.42, 6.15.10, 6.16.1
```
ステージング環境で 5.4.297, 5.10.241, 5.15.190, 6.1.148, 6.6.102, 6.12.42, 6.15.10, 6.16.1 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":"4.19.0"},{"fixed":"5.4.297"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"5.5.0"},{"fixed":"5.10.241"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"5.11.0"},{"fixed":"5.15.190"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"5.16.0"},{"fixed":"6.1.148"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"6.2.0"},{"fixed":"6.6.102"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"6.7.0"},{"fixed":"6.12.42"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"6.13.0"},{"fixed":"6.15.10"}]},{"type":"ECOSYSTEM","events":[{"introduced":"6.16.0"},{"fixed":"6.16.1"}]}]

Fix status by distribution

Fixed packages published by each distribution for this CVE

BellSoft Alpaquita BELL-CVE-2025-38650 linux-lts Fixed in: 6.1.151-r0
Debian DEBIAN-CVE-2025-38650 linux Fixed in: 5.10.244-1
Ubuntu UBUNTU-CVE-2025-38650 linux