CVE-2022-50269 drm/vkms: Fix memory leak in vkms_init()
A memory leak in the Linux kernel's VKMS driver during module initialization failure can lead to resource exhaustion and denial of service.
- 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-2022-50269?
CVE-2022-50269 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 15 Sep 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:
drm/vkms: Fix memory leak in vkms_init()
A memory leak was reported after the vkms module install failed.
unreferenced object 0xffff88810bc28520 (size 16): comm "modprobe", pid 9662, jiffies 4298009455 (age 42.590s) hex dump (first 16 bytes): 01 01 00 64 81 88 ff ff 00 00 dc 0a 81 88 ff ff ...d............ backtrace: [<00000000e7561ff8>] kmalloc_trace+0x27/0x60 [<000000000b1954a0>] 0xffffffffc45200a9 [<00000000abbf1da0>] do_one_initcall+0xd0/0x4f0 [<000000001505ee87>] do_init_module+0x1a4/0x680 [<00000000958079ad>] load_module+0x6249/0x7110 [<00000000117e4696>] __do_sys_finit_module+0x140/0x200 [<00000000f74b12d2>] do_syscall_64+0x35/0x80 [<000000008fc6fcde>] entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x46/0xb0
The reason is that the vkms_init() returns without checking the return value of vkms_create(), and if the vkms_create() failed, the config allocated at the beginning of vkms_init() is leaked.
vkms_init() config = kmalloc(...) # config allocated ... return vkms_create() # vkms_create failed and config is leaked
Fix this problem by checking return value of vkms_create() and free the config if error happened.
Weakness: CWE-401
Which versions are affected by CVE-2022-50269?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2022-50269?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.
Is CVE-2022-50269 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2022-50269 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as DEBIAN-CVE-2022-50269, GHSA-22jx-v9jm-qjqq, UBUNTU-CVE-2022-50269.