# CVE-2024-35875: x86/coco: Require seeding RNG with RDRAND on CoCo systems

> Linux kernel CoCo systems may boot with a weak RNG if RDRAND fails, compromising cryptographic security against malicious hosts.

- **Severity:** High 8.4 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Local or same network only
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** Yes
- **Published:** 19 May 2024
- **Updated:** 5 Aug 2026
- **Also known as:** BELL-CVE-2024-35875, DEBIAN-CVE-2024-35875, GHSA-43j5-9vgx-7g7j, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2024-35875, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2024-35875, UBUNTU-CVE-2024-35875

## What is CVE-2024-35875?

CVE-2024-35875 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 19 May 2024. 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:

x86/coco: Require seeding RNG with RDRAND on CoCo systems

There are few uses of CoCo that don't rely on working cryptography and
hence a working RNG. Unfortunately, the CoCo threat model means that the
VM host cannot be trusted and may actively work against guests to
extract secrets or manipulate computation. Since a malicious host can
modify or observe nearly all inputs to guests, the only remaining source
of entropy for CoCo guests is RDRAND.

If RDRAND is broken -- due to CPU hardware fault -- the RNG as a whole
is meant to gracefully continue on gathering entropy from other sources,
but since there aren't other sources on CoCo, this is catastrophic.
This is mostly a concern at boot time when initially seeding the RNG, as
after that the consequences of a broken RDRAND are much more
theoretical.

So, try at boot to seed the RNG using 256 bits of RDRAND output. If this
fails, panic(). This will also trigger if the system is booted without
RDRAND, as RDRAND is essential for a safe CoCo boot.

Add this deliberately to be "just a CoCo x86 driver feature" and not
part of the RNG itself. Many device drivers and platforms have some
desire to contribute something to the RNG, and add_device_randomness()
is specifically meant for this purpose.

Any driver can call it with seed data of any quality, or even garbage
quality, and it can only possibly make the quality of the RNG better or
have no effect, but can never make it worse.

Rather than trying to build something into the core of the RNG, consider
the particular CoCo issue just a CoCo issue, and therefore separate it
all out into driver (well, arch/platform) code.

  [ bp: Massage commit message. ]

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2024-35875?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2024-35875?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2024-35875 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-35875 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-2024-35875 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2024-35875 is a high-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 19 May 2024. 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-2024-35875 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-2024-35875/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-35875/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2024-35875
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-35875
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2024-35875

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-35875/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.
