CVE-2022-49303 drivers: staging: rtl8192eu: Fix deadlock in rtw_joinbss_event_prehandle

What is CVE-2022-49303?

CVE-2022-49303 is a medium-severity 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:

drivers: staging: rtl8192eu: Fix deadlock in rtw_joinbss_event_prehandle

There is a deadlock in rtw_joinbss_event_prehandle(), which is shown below:

(Thread 1) | (Thread 2) | _set_timer() rtw_joinbss_event_prehandle()| mod_timer() spin_lock_bh() //(1) | (wait a time) ... | rtw_join_timeout_handler() | _rtw_join_timeout_handler() del_timer_sync() | spin_lock_bh() //(2) (wait timer to stop) | ...

We hold pmlmepriv->lock in position (1) of thread 1 and use del_timer_sync() to wait timer to stop, but timer handler also need pmlmepriv->lock in position (2) of thread 2. As a result, rtw_joinbss_event_prehandle() will block forever.

This patch extracts del_timer_sync() from the protection of spin_lock_bh(), which could let timer handler to obtain the needed lock. What`s more, we change spin_lock_bh() to spin_lock_irq() in _rtw_join_timeout_handler() in order to prevent deadlock.

Weakness: CWE-667

Which versions are affected by CVE-2022-49303?

It affects 1 product.

Products include Linux kernel.

How do I fix CVE-2022-49303?

Apply the vendor's patch.

Is CVE-2022-49303 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2022-49303 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel

• CVE-2026-53266 Linux Kernel Out-of-Bounds Write Exploited High 8.8
• CVE-2013-6282 Linux Kernel Improper Input Validation Exploited High 8.8
• CVE-2022-0185 Linux Kernel Heap-Based Buffer Overflow Exploited High 8.4
• CVE-2013-2094 Linux Kernel Privilege Escalation Exploited High 8.4
• CVE-2026-53362 Linux Kernel Unspecified Exploited High 7.8

All Linux kernel vulnerabilities

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as AZL-60303, DEBIAN-CVE-2022-49303, GHSA-9qmf-mrc9-rwrx, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2022-49303, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2022-49303, UBUNTU-CVE-2022-49303.