# CVE-2024-50236: wifi: ath10k: Fix memory leak in management tx

> A memory leak in the ath10k WiFi driver allows attackers to exhaust kernel memory, potentially causing a denial of service.

- **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:** 9 Nov 2024
- **Updated:** 11 May 2026
- **Also known as:** AZL-53174, AZL-53192, BELL-CVE-2024-50236, DEBIAN-CVE-2024-50236, GHSA-rwhv-4jcg-g276, UBUNTU-CVE-2024-50236

## What is CVE-2024-50236?

CVE-2024-50236 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 9 Nov 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:

wifi: ath10k: Fix memory leak in management tx

In the current logic, memory is allocated for storing the MSDU context
during management packet TX but this memory is not being freed during
management TX completion. Similar leaks are seen in the management TX
cleanup logic.

Kmemleak reports this problem as below,

unreferenced object 0xffffff80b64ed250 (size 16):
  comm "kworker/u16:7", pid 148, jiffies 4294687130 (age 714.199s)
  hex dump (first 16 bytes):
    00 2b d8 d8 80 ff ff ff c4 74 e9 fd 07 00 00 00  .+.......t......
  backtrace:
    [<ffffffe6e7b245dc>] __kmem_cache_alloc_node+0x1e4/0x2d8
    [<ffffffe6e7adde88>] kmalloc_trace+0x48/0x110
    [<ffffffe6bbd765fc>] ath10k_wmi_tlv_op_gen_mgmt_tx_send+0xd4/0x1d8 [ath10k_core]
    [<ffffffe6bbd3eed4>] ath10k_mgmt_over_wmi_tx_work+0x134/0x298 [ath10k_core]
    [<ffffffe6e78d5974>] process_scheduled_works+0x1ac/0x400
    [<ffffffe6e78d60b8>] worker_thread+0x208/0x328
    [<ffffffe6e78dc890>] kthread+0x100/0x1c0
    [<ffffffe6e78166c0>] ret_from_fork+0x10/0x20

Free the memory during completion and cleanup to fix the leak.

Protect the mgmt_pending_tx idr_remove() operation in
ath10k_wmi_tlv_op_cleanup_mgmt_tx_send() using ar->data_lock similar to
other instances.

Tested-on: WCN3990 hw1.0 SNOC WLAN.HL.2.0-01387-QCAHLSWMTPLZ-1

Weakness: CWE-401 (Missing Release of Memory after Effective Lifetime)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2024-50236?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2024-50236?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2024-50236 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2024-50236 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-2024-50236 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2024-50236 is a medium-severity denial of service vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 9 Nov 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-2024-50236 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-2024-50236/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-50236/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2024-50236
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-50236
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2024-50236

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2024-50236/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.
