# CVE-2023-53829: f2fs: flush inode if atomic file is aborted

> A local attacker can trigger a kernel bug check and crash the system by aborting an atomic file operation in the F2FS filesystem.

- **Severity:** High 7.8 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/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:** 9 Dec 2025
- **Updated:** 5 Aug 2026
- **Also known as:** BELL-CVE-2023-53829, DEBIAN-CVE-2023-53829, GHSA-38rj-5vp6-wr6c, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2023-53829, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2023-53829, UBUNTU-CVE-2023-53829

## What is CVE-2023-53829?

CVE-2023-53829 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux, published on 9 Dec 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:

f2fs: flush inode if atomic file is aborted

Let's flush the inode being aborted atomic operation to avoid stale dirty
inode during eviction in this call stack:

  f2fs_mark_inode_dirty_sync+0x22/0x40 [f2fs]
  f2fs_abort_atomic_write+0xc4/0xf0 [f2fs]
  f2fs_evict_inode+0x3f/0x690 [f2fs]
  ? sugov_start+0x140/0x140
  evict+0xc3/0x1c0
  evict_inodes+0x17b/0x210
  generic_shutdown_super+0x32/0x120
  kill_block_super+0x21/0x50
  deactivate_locked_super+0x31/0x90
  cleanup_mnt+0x100/0x160
  task_work_run+0x59/0x90
  do_exit+0x33b/0xa50
  do_group_exit+0x2d/0x80
  __x64_sys_exit_group+0x14/0x20
  do_syscall_64+0x3b/0x90
  entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x63/0xcd

This triggers f2fs_bug_on() in f2fs_evict_inode:
 f2fs_bug_on(sbi, is_inode_flag_set(inode, FI_DIRTY_INODE));

This fixes the syzbot report:

loop0: detected capacity change from 0 to 131072
F2FS-fs (loop0): invalid crc value
F2FS-fs (loop0): Found nat_bits in checkpoint
F2FS-fs (loop0): Mounted with checkpoint version = 48b305e4
------------[ cut here ]------------
kernel BUG at fs/f2fs/inode.c:869!
invalid opcode: 0000 [#1] PREEMPT SMP KASAN
CPU: 0 PID: 5014 Comm: syz-executor220 Not tainted 6.4.0-syzkaller-11479-g6cd06ab12d1a #0
Hardware name: Google Google Compute Engine/Google Compute Engine, BIOS Google 05/27/2023
RIP: 0010:f2fs_evict_inode+0x172d/0x1e00 fs/f2fs/inode.c:869
Code: ff df 48 c1 ea 03 80 3c 02 00 0f 85 6a 06 00 00 8b 75 40 ba 01 00 00 00 4c 89 e7 e8 6d ce 06 00 e9 aa fc ff ff e8 63 22 e2 fd <0f> 0b e8 5c 22 e2 fd 48 c7 c0 a8 3a 18 8d 48 ba 00 00 00 00 00 fc
RSP: 0018:ffffc90003a6fa00 EFLAGS: 00010293
RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: 0000000000000001 RCX: 0000000000000000
RDX: ffff8880273b8000 RSI: ffffffff83a2bd0d RDI: 0000000000000007
RBP: ffff888077db91b0 R08: 0000000000000007 R09: 0000000000000000
R10: 0000000000000001 R11: 0000000000000001 R12: ffff888029a3c000
R13: ffff888077db9660 R14: ffff888029a3c0b8 R15: ffff888077db9c50
FS:  0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff8880b9800000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
CS:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
CR2: 00007f1909bb9000 CR3: 00000000276a9000 CR4: 0000000000350ef0
Call Trace:
 <TASK>
 evict+0x2ed/0x6b0 fs/inode.c:665
 dispose_list+0x117/0x1e0 fs/inode.c:698
 evict_inodes+0x345/0x440 fs/inode.c:748
 generic_shutdown_super+0xaf/0x480 fs/super.c:478
 kill_block_super+0x64/0xb0 fs/super.c:1417
 kill_f2fs_super+0x2af/0x3c0 fs/f2fs/super.c:4704
 deactivate_locked_super+0x98/0x160 fs/super.c:330
 deactivate_super+0xb1/0xd0 fs/super.c:361
 cleanup_mnt+0x2ae/0x3d0 fs/namespace.c:1254
 task_work_run+0x16f/0x270 kernel/task_work.c:179
 exit_task_work include/linux/task_work.h:38 [inline]
 do_exit+0xa9a/0x29a0 kernel/exit.c:874
 do_group_exit+0xd4/0x2a0 kernel/exit.c:1024
 __do_sys_exit_group kernel/exit.c:1035 [inline]
 __se_sys_exit_group kernel/exit.c:1033 [inline]
 __x64_sys_exit_group+0x3e/0x50 kernel/exit.c:1033
 do_syscall_x64 arch/x86/entry/common.c:50 [inline]
 do_syscall_64+0x39/0xb0 arch/x86/entry/common.c:80
 entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x63/0xcd
RIP: 0033:0x7f309be71a09
Code: Unable to access opcode bytes at 0x7f309be719df.
RSP: 002b:00007fff171df518 EFLAGS: 00000246 ORIG_RAX: 00000000000000e7
RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00007f309bef7330 RCX: 00007f309be71a09
RDX: 000000000000003c RSI: 00000000000000e7 RDI: 0000000000000001
RBP: 0000000000000001 R08: ffffffffffffffc0 R09: 00007f309bef1e40
R10: 0000000000010600 R11: 0000000000000246 R12: 00007f309bef7330
R13: 0000000000000001 R14: 0000000000000000 R15: 0000000000000001
 </TASK>
Modules linked in:
---[ end trace 0000000000000000 ]---
RIP: 0010:f2fs_evict_inode+0x172d/0x1e00 fs/f2fs/inode.c:869
Code: ff df 48 c1 ea 03 80 3c 02 00 0f 85 6a 06 00 00 8b 75 40 ba 01 00 00 00 4c 89 e7 e8 6d ce 06 00 e9 aa fc ff ff e8 63 22 e2 fd <0f> 0b e8 5c 22 e2 fd 48 c7 c0 a8 3a 18 8d 48 ba 00 00 00 00 00 fc
RSP: 0018:ffffc90003a6fa00 EFLAGS: 00010293
RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: 0000000000
---truncated---

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-53829?


## How do I fix CVE-2023-53829?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2023-53829 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-53829 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2023-53829 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2023-53829 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux, published on 9 Dec 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-2023-53829 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: Linux. 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-2023-53829/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-53829/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2023-53829
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2023-53829
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2023-53829

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2023-53829/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.