CVE-2023-54253 btrfs: set page extent mapped after read_folio in relocate_one_page
A local attacker can trigger a kernel panic in the Btrfs filesystem during balance operations, causing a 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-2023-54253?
CVE-2023-54253 is a denial of service vulnerability in Linux, published on 30 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:
btrfs: set page extent mapped after read_folio in relocate_one_page
One of the CI runs triggered the following panic
assertion failed: PagePrivate(page) && page->private, in fs/btrfs/subpage.c:229 ------------[ cut here ]------------ kernel BUG at fs/btrfs/subpage.c:229! Internal error: Oops - BUG: 00000000f2000800 [#1] SMP CPU: 0 PID: 923660 Comm: btrfs Not tainted 6.5.0-rc3+ #1 pstate: 61400005 (nZCv daif +PAN -UAO -TCO +DIT -SSBS BTYPE=--) pc : btrfs_subpage_assert+0xbc/0xf0 lr : btrfs_subpage_assert+0xbc/0xf0 sp : ffff800093213720 x29: ffff800093213720 x28: ffff8000932138b4 x27: 000000000c280000 x26: 00000001b5d00000 x25: 000000000c281000 x24: 000000000c281fff x23: 0000000000001000 x22: 0000000000000000 x21: ffffff42b95bf880 x20: ffff42b9528e0000 x19: 0000000000001000 x18: ffffffffffffffff x17: 667274622f736620 x16: 6e69202c65746176 x15: 0000000000000028 x14: 0000000000000003 x13: 00000000002672d7 x12: 0000000000000000 x11: ffffcd3f0ccd9204 x10: ffffcd3f0554ae50 x9 : ffffcd3f0379528c x8 : ffff800093213428 x7 : 0000000000000000 x6 : ffffcd3f091771e8 x5 : ffff42b97f333948 x4 : 0000000000000000 x3 : 0000000000000000 x2 : 0000000000000000 x1 : ffff42b9556cde80 x0 : 000000000000004f Call trace: btrfs_subpage_assert+0xbc/0xf0 btrfs_subpage_set_dirty+0x38/0xa0 btrfs_page_set_dirty+0x58/0x88 relocate_one_page+0x204/0x5f0 relocate_file_extent_cluster+0x11c/0x180 relocate_data_extent+0xd0/0xf8 relocate_block_group+0x3d0/0x4e8 btrfs_relocate_block_group+0x2d8/0x490 btrfs_relocate_chunk+0x54/0x1a8 btrfs_balance+0x7f4/0x1150 btrfs_ioctl+0x10f0/0x20b8 __arm64_sys_ioctl+0x120/0x11d8 invoke_syscall.constprop.0+0x80/0xd8 do_el0_svc+0x6c/0x158 el0_svc+0x50/0x1b0 el0t_64_sync_handler+0x120/0x130 el0t_64_sync+0x194/0x198 Code: 91098021 b0007fa0 91346000 97e9c6d2 (d4210000)
This is the same problem outlined in 17b17fcd6d44 ("btrfs: set_page_extent_mapped after read_folio in btrfs_cont_expand") , and the fix is the same. I originally looked for the same pattern elsewhere in our code, but mistakenly skipped over this code because I saw the page cache readahead before we set_page_extent_mapped, not realizing that this was only in the !page case, that we can still end up with a !uptodate page and then do the btrfs_read_folio further down.
The fix here is the same as the above mentioned patch, move the set_page_extent_mapped call to after the btrfs_read_folio() block to make sure that we have the subpage blocksize stuff setup properly before using the page.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2023-54253?
How do I fix CVE-2023-54253?
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-2023-54253 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2023-54253 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2023-54253, DEBIAN-CVE-2023-54253, GHSA-fjw2-7qv4-gqxh, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2023-54253, UBUNTU-CVE-2023-54253.