# CVE-2021-47563: ice: avoid bpf_prog refcount underflow > A refcount underflow in the Intel ice driver causes a use-after-free condition, leading to a kernel crash when XDP resources are rebuilt. - **Severity:** Medium 5.5 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H`) - **Exploited in the wild:** Not known - **Login needed:** Any signed-in user - **Attackable:** Local or same network only - **Victim action needed:** Not needed - **Fix available:** Yes - **Published:** 24 May 2024 - **Updated:** 11 May 2026 - **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2021-47563, UBUNTU-CVE-2021-47563 ## What is CVE-2021-47563? CVE-2021-47563 is a medium-severity use after free vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 24 May 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim. ### Official description In the Linux kernel, the following vulnerability has been resolved: ice: avoid bpf_prog refcount underflow Ice driver has the routines for managing XDP resources that are shared between ndo_bpf op and VSI rebuild flow. The latter takes place for example when user changes queue count on an interface via ethtool's set_channels(). There is an issue around the bpf_prog refcounting when VSI is being rebuilt - since ice_prepare_xdp_rings() is called with vsi->xdp_prog as an argument that is used later on by ice_vsi_assign_bpf_prog(), same bpf_prog pointers are swapped with each other. Then it is also interpreted as an 'old_prog' which in turn causes us to call bpf_prog_put on it that will decrement its refcount. Below splat can be interpreted in a way that due to zero refcount of a bpf_prog it is wiped out from the system while kernel still tries to refer to it: [ 481.069429] BUG: unable to handle page fault for address: ffffc9000640f038 [ 481.077390] #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode [ 481.083335] #PF: error_code(0x0000) - not-present page [ 481.089276] PGD 100000067 P4D 100000067 PUD 1001cb067 PMD 106d2b067 PTE 0 [ 481.097141] Oops: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP PTI [ 481.101980] CPU: 12 PID: 3339 Comm: sudo Tainted: G OE 5.15.0-rc5+ #1 [ 481.110840] Hardware name: Intel Corp. GRANTLEY/GRANTLEY, BIOS GRRFCRB1.86B.0276.D07.1605190235 05/19/2016 [ 481.122021] RIP: 0010:dev_xdp_prog_id+0x25/0x40 [ 481.127265] Code: 80 00 00 00 00 0f 1f 44 00 00 89 f6 48 c1 e6 04 48 01 fe 48 8b 86 98 08 00 00 48 85 c0 74 13 48 8b 50 18 31 c0 48 85 d2 74 07 <48> 8b 42 38 8b 40 20 c3 48 8b 96 90 08 00 00 eb e8 66 2e 0f 1f 84 [ 481.148991] RSP: 0018:ffffc90007b63868 EFLAGS: 00010286 [ 481.155034] RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: ffff889080824000 RCX: 0000000000000000 [ 481.163278] RDX: ffffc9000640f000 RSI: ffff889080824010 RDI: ffff889080824000 [ 481.171527] RBP: ffff888107af7d00 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: ffff88810db5f6e0 [ 481.179776] R10: 0000000000000000 R11: ffff8890885b9988 R12: ffff88810db5f4bc [ 481.188026] R13: 0000000000000000 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: 0000000000000000 [ 481.196276] FS: 00007f5466d5bec0(0000) GS:ffff88903fb00000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000 [ 481.205633] CS: 0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033 [ 481.212279] CR2: ffffc9000640f038 CR3: 000000014429c006 CR4: 00000000003706e0 [ 481.220530] DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000 [ 481.228771] DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000fffe0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400 [ 481.237029] Call Trace: [ 481.239856] rtnl_fill_ifinfo+0x768/0x12e0 [ 481.244602] rtnl_dump_ifinfo+0x525/0x650 [ 481.249246] ? __alloc_skb+0xa5/0x280 [ 481.253484] netlink_dump+0x168/0x3c0 [ 481.257725] netlink_recvmsg+0x21e/0x3e0 [ 481.262263] ____sys_recvmsg+0x87/0x170 [ 481.266707] ? __might_fault+0x20/0x30 [ 481.271046] ? _copy_from_user+0x66/0xa0 [ 481.275591] ? iovec_from_user+0xf6/0x1c0 [ 481.280226] ___sys_recvmsg+0x82/0x100 [ 481.284566] ? sock_sendmsg+0x5e/0x60 [ 481.288791] ? __sys_sendto+0xee/0x150 [ 481.293129] __sys_recvmsg+0x56/0xa0 [ 481.297267] do_syscall_64+0x3b/0xc0 [ 481.301395] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x44/0xae [ 481.307238] RIP: 0033:0x7f5466f39617 [ 481.311373] Code: 0c 00 f7 d8 64 89 02 48 c7 c0 ff ff ff ff eb bd 0f 1f 00 f3 0f 1e fa 64 8b 04 25 18 00 00 00 85 c0 75 10 b8 2f 00 00 00 0f 05 <48> 3d 00 f0 ff ff 77 51 c3 48 83 ec 28 89 54 24 1c 48 89 74 24 10 [ 481.342944] RSP: 002b:00007ffedc7f4308 EFLAGS: 00000246 ORIG_RAX: 000000000000002f [ 481.361783] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00007ffedc7f5460 RCX: 00007f5466f39617 [ 481.380278] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 00007ffedc7f5360 RDI: 0000000000000003 [ 481.398500] RBP: 00007ffedc7f53f0 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: 000055d556f04d50 [ 481.416463] R10: 0000000000000077 R11: 0000000000000246 R12: 00007ffedc7f5360 [ 481.434131] R13: 00007ffedc7f5350 R14: 00007ffedc7f5344 R15: 0000000000000e98 [ 481.451520] Modules linked in: ice ---truncated--- ## Which versions are affected by CVE-2021-47563? It affects 1 product. Products: Linux kernel. ## How do I fix CVE-2021-47563? Apply the vendor's patch. ## Is CVE-2021-47563 being exploited? There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-47563 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-2021-47563 and fix it if it is affected. What it is: CVE-2021-47563 is a medium-severity use after free vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 24 May 2024. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim. Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-47563 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-2021-47563/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47563/index.md) ``` ## Sources - CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-47563 - NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-47563 - OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2021-47563 --- From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-47563/ Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.