# CVE-2023-53240: xsk: check IFF_UP earlier in Tx path

> A local attacker can trigger a kernel NULL pointer dereference in the XSK Tx path, causing a system crash.

- **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:** 15 Sep 2025
- **Updated:** 23 May 2026
- **Also known as:** AZL-71233, BELL-CVE-2023-53240, DEBIAN-CVE-2023-53240, GHSA-5qr9-cjj5-7m79, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2023-53240, UBUNTU-CVE-2023-53240

## What is CVE-2023-53240?

CVE-2023-53240 is a medium-severity 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:

xsk: check IFF_UP earlier in Tx path

Xsk Tx can be triggered via either sendmsg() or poll() syscalls. These
two paths share a call to common function xsk_xmit() which has two
sanity checks within. A pseudo code example to show the two paths:

__xsk_sendmsg() :                       xsk_poll():
if (unlikely(!xsk_is_bound(xs)))        if (unlikely(!xsk_is_bound(xs)))
    return -ENXIO;                          return mask;
if (unlikely(need_wait))                (...)
    return -EOPNOTSUPP;                 xsk_xmit()
mark napi id
(...)
xsk_xmit()

xsk_xmit():
if (unlikely(!(xs->dev->flags & IFF_UP)))
	return -ENETDOWN;
if (unlikely(!xs->tx))
	return -ENOBUFS;

As it can be observed above, in sendmsg() napi id can be marked on
interface that was not brought up and this causes a NULL ptr
dereference:

[31757.505631] BUG: kernel NULL pointer dereference, address: 0000000000000018
[31757.512710] #PF: supervisor read access in kernel mode
[31757.517936] #PF: error_code(0x0000) - not-present page
[31757.523149] PGD 0 P4D 0
[31757.525726] Oops: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP NOPTI
[31757.530154] CPU: 26 PID: 95641 Comm: xdpsock Not tainted 6.2.0-rc5+ #40
[31757.536871] Hardware name: Intel Corporation S2600WFT/S2600WFT, BIOS SE5C620.86B.02.01.0008.031920191559 03/19/2019
[31757.547457] RIP: 0010:xsk_sendmsg+0xde/0x180
[31757.551799] Code: 00 75 a2 48 8b 00 a8 04 75 9b 84 d2 74 69 8b 85 14 01 00 00 85 c0 75 1b 48 8b 85 28 03 00 00 48 8b 80 98 00 00 00 48 8b 40 20 <8b> 40 18 89 85 14 01 00 00 8b bd 14 01 00 00 81 ff 00 01 00 00 0f
[31757.570840] RSP: 0018:ffffc90034f27dc0 EFLAGS: 00010246
[31757.576143] RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: ffffc90034f27e18 RCX: 0000000000000000
[31757.583389] RDX: 0000000000000001 RSI: ffffc90034f27e18 RDI: ffff88984cf3c100
[31757.590631] RBP: ffff88984714a800 R08: ffff88984714a800 R09: 0000000000000000
[31757.597877] R10: 0000000000000001 R11: 0000000000000000 R12: 00000000fffffffa
[31757.605123] R13: 0000000000000000 R14: 0000000000000003 R15: 0000000000000000
[31757.612364] FS:  00007fb4c5931180(0000) GS:ffff88afdfa00000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
[31757.620571] CS:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
[31757.626406] CR2: 0000000000000018 CR3: 000000184b41c003 CR4: 00000000007706e0
[31757.633648] DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000
[31757.640894] DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000fffe0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400
[31757.648139] PKRU: 55555554
[31757.650894] Call Trace:
[31757.653385]  <TASK>
[31757.655524]  sock_sendmsg+0x8f/0xa0
[31757.659077]  ? sockfd_lookup_light+0x12/0x70
[31757.663416]  __sys_sendto+0xfc/0x170
[31757.667051]  ? do_sched_setscheduler+0xdb/0x1b0
[31757.671658]  __x64_sys_sendto+0x20/0x30
[31757.675557]  do_syscall_64+0x38/0x90
[31757.679197]  entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x72/0xdc
[31757.687969] Code: 8e f6 ff 44 8b 4c 24 2c 4c 8b 44 24 20 41 89 c4 44 8b 54 24 28 48 8b 54 24 18 b8 2c 00 00 00 48 8b 74 24 10 8b 7c 24 08 0f 05 <48> 3d 00 f0 ff ff 77 3a 44 89 e7 48 89 44 24 08 e8 b5 8e f6 ff 48
[31757.707007] RSP: 002b:00007ffd49c73c70 EFLAGS: 00000293 ORIG_RAX: 000000000000002c
[31757.714694] RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 000055a996565380 RCX: 00007fb4c5727c16
[31757.721939] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: 0000000000000000 RDI: 0000000000000003
[31757.729184] RBP: 0000000000000040 R08: 0000000000000000 R09: 0000000000000000
[31757.736429] R10: 0000000000000040 R11: 0000000000000293 R12: 0000000000000000
[31757.743673] R13: 0000000000000000 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: 0000000000000000
[31757.754940]  </TASK>

To fix this, let's make xsk_xmit a function that will be responsible for
generic Tx, where RCU is handled accordingly and pull out sanity checks
and xs->zc handling. Populate sanity checks to __xsk_sendmsg() and
xsk_poll().

Weakness: CWE-476 (NULL Pointer Dereference)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-53240?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2023-53240?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2023-53240 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-53240 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-2023-53240 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2023-53240 is a medium-severity 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.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-53240 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-2023-53240/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-53240/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-53240
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-53240
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2023-53240

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-53240/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.