# CVE-2021-47448: mptcp: fix possible stall on recvmsg()

> A local attacker can cause a system hang or crash by triggering an infinite loop in the MPTCP recvmsg function.

- **Severity:** High 7.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 22 May 2024
- **Updated:** 5 Aug 2026
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2021-47448, GHSA-qh22-5q6m-7h2p, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2021-47448, UBUNTU-CVE-2021-47448

## What is CVE-2021-47448?

CVE-2021-47448 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 22 May 2024. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

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

mptcp: fix possible stall on recvmsg()

recvmsg() can enter an infinite loop if the caller provides the
MSG_WAITALL, the data present in the receive queue is not sufficient to
fulfill the request, and no more data is received by the peer.

When the above happens, mptcp_wait_data() will always return with
no wait, as the MPTCP_DATA_READY flag checked by such function is
set and never cleared in such code path.

Leveraging the above syzbot was able to trigger an RCU stall:

rcu: INFO: rcu_preempt self-detected stall on CPU
rcu:    0-...!: (10499 ticks this GP) idle=0af/1/0x4000000000000000 softirq=10678/10678 fqs=1
        (t=10500 jiffies g=13089 q=109)
rcu: rcu_preempt kthread starved for 10497 jiffies! g13089 f0x0 RCU_GP_WAIT_FQS(5) ->state=0x0 ->cpu=1
rcu:    Unless rcu_preempt kthread gets sufficient CPU time, OOM is now expected behavior.
rcu: RCU grace-period kthread stack dump:
task:rcu_preempt     state:R  running task     stack:28696 pid:   14 ppid:     2 flags:0x00004000
Call Trace:
 context_switch kernel/sched/core.c:4955 [inline]
 __schedule+0x940/0x26f0 kernel/sched/core.c:6236
 schedule+0xd3/0x270 kernel/sched/core.c:6315
 schedule_timeout+0x14a/0x2a0 kernel/time/timer.c:1881
 rcu_gp_fqs_loop+0x186/0x810 kernel/rcu/tree.c:1955
 rcu_gp_kthread+0x1de/0x320 kernel/rcu/tree.c:2128
 kthread+0x405/0x4f0 kernel/kthread.c:327
 ret_from_fork+0x1f/0x30 arch/x86/entry/entry_64.S:295
rcu: Stack dump where RCU GP kthread last ran:
Sending NMI from CPU 0 to CPUs 1:
NMI backtrace for cpu 1
CPU: 1 PID: 8510 Comm: syz-executor827 Not tainted 5.15.0-rc2-next-20210920-syzkaller #0
Hardware name: Google Google Compute Engine/Google Compute Engine, BIOS Google 01/01/2011
RIP: 0010:bytes_is_nonzero mm/kasan/generic.c:84 [inline]
RIP: 0010:memory_is_nonzero mm/kasan/generic.c:102 [inline]
RIP: 0010:memory_is_poisoned_n mm/kasan/generic.c:128 [inline]
RIP: 0010:memory_is_poisoned mm/kasan/generic.c:159 [inline]
RIP: 0010:check_region_inline mm/kasan/generic.c:180 [inline]
RIP: 0010:kasan_check_range+0xc8/0x180 mm/kasan/generic.c:189
Code: 38 00 74 ed 48 8d 50 08 eb 09 48 83 c0 01 48 39 d0 74 7a 80 38 00 74 f2 48 89 c2 b8 01 00 00 00 48 85 d2 75 56 5b 5d 41 5c c3 <48> 85 d2 74 5e 48 01 ea eb 09 48 83 c0 01 48 39 d0 74 50 80 38 00
RSP: 0018:ffffc9000cd676c8 EFLAGS: 00000283
RAX: ffffed100e9a110e RBX: ffffed100e9a110f RCX: ffffffff88ea062a
RDX: 0000000000000001 RSI: 0000000000000008 RDI: ffff888074d08870
RBP: ffffed100e9a110e R08: 0000000000000001 R09: ffff888074d08877
R10: ffffed100e9a110e R11: 0000000000000000 R12: ffff888074d08000
R13: ffff888074d08000 R14: ffff888074d08088 R15: ffff888074d08000
FS:  0000555556d8e300(0000) GS:ffff8880b9d00000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
S:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
CR2: 0000000020000180 CR3: 0000000068909000 CR4: 00000000001506e0
DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000
DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000fffe0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400
Call Trace:
 instrument_atomic_read_write include/linux/instrumented.h:101 [inline]
 test_and_clear_bit include/asm-generic/bitops/instrumented-atomic.h:83 [inline]
 mptcp_release_cb+0x14a/0x210 net/mptcp/protocol.c:3016
 release_sock+0xb4/0x1b0 net/core/sock.c:3204
 mptcp_wait_data net/mptcp/protocol.c:1770 [inline]
 mptcp_recvmsg+0xfd1/0x27b0 net/mptcp/protocol.c:2080
 inet6_recvmsg+0x11b/0x5e0 net/ipv6/af_inet6.c:659
 sock_recvmsg_nosec net/socket.c:944 [inline]
 ____sys_recvmsg+0x527/0x600 net/socket.c:2626
 ___sys_recvmsg+0x127/0x200 net/socket.c:2670
 do_recvmmsg+0x24d/0x6d0 net/socket.c:2764
 __sys_recvmmsg net/socket.c:2843 [inline]
 __do_sys_recvmmsg net/socket.c:2866 [inline]
 __se_sys_recvmmsg net/socket.c:2859 [inline]
 __x64_sys_recvmmsg+0x20b/0x260 net/socket.c:2859
 do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:50 [inline]
 do_syscall_64+0x35/0xb0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:80
 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae
RIP: 0033:0x7fc200d2
---truncated---

Weakness: CWE-835 (Loop with Unreachable Exit Condition)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2021-47448?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2021-47448?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2021-47448 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-47448 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

- [CVE-2026-53266](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53266/): Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-6282](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-6282/): Linux Kernel Improper Input Validation (high 8.8, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2022-0185](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-0185/): Linux Kernel Heap-Based Buffer Overflow (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2013-2094](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2013-2094/): Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation (high 8.4, exploited in the wild)
- [CVE-2026-53362](https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2026-53362/): Linux Kernel Unspecified (high 7.8, exploited in the wild)

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2021-47448 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2021-47448 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 22 May 2024. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-47448 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux kernel. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47448/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47448/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-47448
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-47448
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2021-47448

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47448/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.