# CVE-2022-48640: bonding: fix NULL deref in bond_rr_gen_slave_id

> A NULL pointer dereference in the Linux kernel bonding driver causes a system crash when switching modes on a bond created with a non-default mode.

- **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:** 28 Apr 2024
- **Updated:** 11 May 2026
- **Also known as:** DEBIAN-CVE-2022-48640, GHSA-h8ph-3hgg-3hxc, UBUNTU-CVE-2022-48640

## What is CVE-2022-48640?

CVE-2022-48640 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 28 Apr 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:

bonding: fix NULL deref in bond_rr_gen_slave_id

Fix a NULL dereference of the struct bonding.rr_tx_counter member because
if a bond is initially created with an initial mode != zero (Round Robin)
the memory required for the counter is never created and when the mode is
changed there is never any attempt to verify the memory is allocated upon
switching modes.

This causes the following Oops on an aarch64 machine:
    [  334.686773] Unable to handle kernel paging request at virtual address ffff2c91ac905000
    [  334.694703] Mem abort info:
    [  334.697486]   ESR = 0x0000000096000004
    [  334.701234]   EC = 0x25: DABT (current EL), IL = 32 bits
    [  334.706536]   SET = 0, FnV = 0
    [  334.709579]   EA = 0, S1PTW = 0
    [  334.712719]   FSC = 0x04: level 0 translation fault
    [  334.717586] Data abort info:
    [  334.720454]   ISV = 0, ISS = 0x00000004
    [  334.724288]   CM = 0, WnR = 0
    [  334.727244] swapper pgtable: 4k pages, 48-bit VAs, pgdp=000008044d662000
    [  334.733944] [ffff2c91ac905000] pgd=0000000000000000, p4d=0000000000000000
    [  334.740734] Internal error: Oops: 96000004 [#1] SMP
    [  334.745602] Modules linked in: bonding tls veth rfkill sunrpc arm_spe_pmu vfat fat acpi_ipmi ipmi_ssif ixgbe igb i40e mdio ipmi_devintf ipmi_msghandler arm_cmn arm_dsu_pmu cppc_cpufreq acpi_tad fuse zram crct10dif_ce ast ghash_ce sbsa_gwdt nvme drm_vram_helper drm_ttm_helper nvme_core ttm xgene_hwmon
    [  334.772217] CPU: 7 PID: 2214 Comm: ping Not tainted 6.0.0-rc4-00133-g64ae13ed4784 #4
    [  334.779950] Hardware name: GIGABYTE R272-P31-00/MP32-AR1-00, BIOS F18v (SCP: 1.08.20211002) 12/01/2021
    [  334.789244] pstate: 60400009 (nZCv daif +PAN -UAO -TCO -DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--)
    [  334.796196] pc : bond_rr_gen_slave_id+0x40/0x124 [bonding]
    [  334.801691] lr : bond_xmit_roundrobin_slave_get+0x38/0xdc [bonding]
    [  334.807962] sp : ffff8000221733e0
    [  334.811265] x29: ffff8000221733e0 x28: ffffdbac8572d198 x27: ffff80002217357c
    [  334.818392] x26: 000000000000002a x25: ffffdbacb33ee000 x24: ffff07ff980fa000
    [  334.825519] x23: ffffdbacb2e398ba x22: ffff07ff98102000 x21: ffff07ff981029c0
    [  334.832646] x20: 0000000000000001 x19: ffff07ff981029c0 x18: 0000000000000014
    [  334.839773] x17: 0000000000000000 x16: ffffdbacb1004364 x15: 0000aaaabe2f5a62
    [  334.846899] x14: ffff07ff8e55d968 x13: ffff07ff8e55db30 x12: 0000000000000000
    [  334.854026] x11: ffffdbacb21532e8 x10: 0000000000000001 x9 : ffffdbac857178ec
    [  334.861153] x8 : ffff07ff9f6e5a28 x7 : 0000000000000000 x6 : 000000007c2b3742
    [  334.868279] x5 : ffff2c91ac905000 x4 : ffff2c91ac905000 x3 : ffff07ff9f554400
    [  334.875406] x2 : ffff2c91ac905000 x1 : 0000000000000001 x0 : ffff07ff981029c0
    [  334.882532] Call trace:
    [  334.884967]  bond_rr_gen_slave_id+0x40/0x124 [bonding]
    [  334.890109]  bond_xmit_roundrobin_slave_get+0x38/0xdc [bonding]
    [  334.896033]  __bond_start_xmit+0x128/0x3a0 [bonding]
    [  334.901001]  bond_start_xmit+0x54/0xb0 [bonding]
    [  334.905622]  dev_hard_start_xmit+0xb4/0x220
    [  334.909798]  __dev_queue_xmit+0x1a0/0x720
    [  334.913799]  arp_xmit+0x3c/0xbc
    [  334.916932]  arp_send_dst+0x98/0xd0
    [  334.920410]  arp_solicit+0xe8/0x230
    [  334.923888]  neigh_probe+0x60/0xb0
    [  334.927279]  __neigh_event_send+0x3b0/0x470
    [  334.931453]  neigh_resolve_output+0x70/0x90
    [  334.935626]  ip_finish_output2+0x158/0x514
    [  334.939714]  __ip_finish_output+0xac/0x1a4
    [  334.943800]  ip_finish_output+0x40/0xfc
    [  334.947626]  ip_output+0xf8/0x1a4
    [  334.950931]  ip_send_skb+0x5c/0x100
    [  334.954410]  ip_push_pending_frames+0x3c/0x60
    [  334.958758]  raw_sendmsg+0x458/0x6d0
    [  334.962325]  inet_sendmsg+0x50/0x80
    [  334.965805]  sock_sendmsg+0x60/0x6c
    [  334.969286]  __sys_sendto+0xc8/0x134
    [  334.972853]  __arm64_sys_sendto+0x34/0x4c
---truncated---

Weakness: CWE-476 (NULL Pointer Dereference)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2022-48640?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2022-48640?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2022-48640 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2022-48640 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-2022-48640 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2022-48640 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 28 Apr 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-2022-48640 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-2022-48640/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-48640/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2022-48640
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2022-48640
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2022-48640

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2022-48640/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.