CVE-2022-49276 jffs2: fix memory leak in jffs2_scan_medium
A memory leak in the Linux kernel's JFFS2 filesystem allows attackers to cause a denial of service via resource exhaustion during mount operations.
- 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
What is CVE-2022-49276?
CVE-2022-49276 is a medium-severity memory corruption vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 26 Feb 2025. 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:
jffs2: fix memory leak in jffs2_scan_medium
If an error is returned in jffs2_scan_eraseblock() and some memory has been added to the jffs2_summary *s, we can observe the following kmemleak report:
-------------------------------------------- unreferenced object 0xffff88812b889c40 (size 64): comm "mount", pid 692, jiffies 4294838325 (age 34.288s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): 40 48 b5 14 81 88 ff ff 01 e0 31 00 00 00 50 00 @H........1...P. 00 00 01 00 00 00 01 00 00 00 02 00 00 00 09 08 ................ backtrace: [<ffffffffae93a3a3>] __kmalloc+0x613/0x910 [<ffffffffaf423b9c>] jffs2_sum_add_dirent_mem+0x5c/0xa0 [<ffffffffb0f3afa8>] jffs2_scan_medium.cold+0x36e5/0x4794 [<ffffffffb0f3dbe1>] jffs2_do_mount_fs.cold+0xa7/0x2267 [<ffffffffaf40acf3>] jffs2_do_fill_super+0x383/0xc30 [<ffffffffaf40c00a>] jffs2_fill_super+0x2ea/0x4c0 [<ffffffffb0315d64>] mtd_get_sb+0x254/0x400 [<ffffffffb0315f5f>] mtd_get_sb_by_nr+0x4f/0xd0 [<ffffffffb0316478>] get_tree_mtd+0x498/0x840 [<ffffffffaf40bd15>] jffs2_get_tree+0x25/0x30 [<ffffffffae9f358d>] vfs_get_tree+0x8d/0x2e0 [<ffffffffaea7a98f>] path_mount+0x50f/0x1e50 [<ffffffffaea7c3d7>] do_mount+0x107/0x130 [<ffffffffaea7c5c5>] __se_sys_mount+0x1c5/0x2f0 [<ffffffffaea7c917>] __x64_sys_mount+0xc7/0x160 [<ffffffffb10142f5>] do_syscall_64+0x45/0x70 unreferenced object 0xffff888114b54840 (size 32): comm "mount", pid 692, jiffies 4294838325 (age 34.288s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): c0 75 b5 14 81 88 ff ff 02 e0 02 00 00 00 02 00 .u.............. 00 00 84 00 00 00 44 00 00 00 6b 6b 6b 6b 6b a5 ......D...kkkkk. backtrace: [<ffffffffae93be24>] kmem_cache_alloc_trace+0x584/0x880 [<ffffffffaf423b04>] jffs2_sum_add_inode_mem+0x54/0x90 [<ffffffffb0f3bd44>] jffs2_scan_medium.cold+0x4481/0x4794 [...] unreferenced object 0xffff888114b57280 (size 32): comm "mount", pid 692, jiffies 4294838393 (age 34.357s) hex dump (first 32 bytes): 10 d5 6c 11 81 88 ff ff 08 e0 05 00 00 00 01 00 ..l............. 00 00 38 02 00 00 28 00 00 00 6b 6b 6b 6b 6b a5 ..8...(...kkkkk. backtrace: [<ffffffffae93be24>] kmem_cache_alloc_trace+0x584/0x880 [<ffffffffaf423c34>] jffs2_sum_add_xattr_mem+0x54/0x90 [<ffffffffb0f3a24f>] jffs2_scan_medium.cold+0x298c/0x4794 [...] unreferenced object 0xffff8881116cd510 (size 16): comm "mount", pid 692, jiffies 4294838395 (age 34.355s) hex dump (first 16 bytes): 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 09 e0 60 02 00 00 6b a5 ..........`...k. backtrace: [<ffffffffae93be24>] kmem_cache_alloc_trace+0x584/0x880 [<ffffffffaf423cc4>] jffs2_sum_add_xref_mem+0x54/0x90 [<ffffffffb0f3b2e3>] jffs2_scan_medium.cold+0x3a20/0x4794 [...] --------------------------------------------
Therefore, we should call jffs2_sum_reset_collected(s) on exit to release the memory added in s. In addition, a new tag "out_buf" is added to prevent the NULL pointer reference caused by s being NULL. (thanks to Zhang Yi for this analysis)
Weakness: CWE-401
Which versions are affected by CVE-2022-49276?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2022-49276?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade to the fixed version. Memory-safe languages, compiler hardening and fuzzing prevent most new cases. More about Memory corruption.
Is CVE-2022-49276 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2022-49276 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2022-49276, GHSA-jg9p-qrj8-5jw6, UBUNTU-CVE-2022-49276.