# CVE-2023-53612: hwmon: (coretemp) Simplify platform device handling

> A null pointer dereference in the Linux kernel coretemp driver can cause a denial of service when drivers_autoprobe is disabled.

- **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:** 4 Oct 2025
- **Updated:** 11 May 2026
- **Also known as:** BELL-CVE-2023-53612, DEBIAN-CVE-2023-53612, GHSA-w3m2-4m45-q2fh, UBUNTU-CVE-2023-53612

## What is CVE-2023-53612?

CVE-2023-53612 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 4 Oct 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:

hwmon: (coretemp) Simplify platform device handling

Coretemp's platform driver is unconventional. All the real work is done
globally by the initcall and CPU hotplug notifiers, while the "driver"
effectively just wraps an allocation and the registration of the hwmon
interface in a long-winded round-trip through the driver core.  The whole
logic of dynamically creating and destroying platform devices to bring
the interfaces up and down is error prone, since it assumes
platform_device_add() will synchronously bind the driver and set drvdata
before it returns, thus results in a NULL dereference if drivers_autoprobe
is turned off for the platform bus. Furthermore, the unusual approach of
doing that from within a CPU hotplug notifier, already commented in the
code that it deadlocks suspend, also causes lockdep issues for other
drivers or subsystems which may want to legitimately register a CPU
hotplug notifier from a platform bus notifier.

All of these issues can be solved by ripping this unusual behaviour out
completely, simply tying the platform devices to the lifetime of the
module itself, and directly managing the hwmon interfaces from the
hotplug notifiers. There is a slight user-visible change in that
/sys/bus/platform/drivers/coretemp will no longer appear, and
/sys/devices/platform/coretemp.n will remain present if package n is
hotplugged off, but hwmon users should really only be looking for the
presence of the hwmon interfaces, whose behaviour remains unchanged.

Weakness: CWE-476 (NULL Pointer Dereference)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-53612?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2023-53612?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2023-53612 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-53612 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-2023-53612 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2023-53612 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 4 Oct 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-2023-53612 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-2023-53612/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-53612/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-53612
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-53612
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2023-53612

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-53612/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.