# CVE-2025-21892: RDMA/mlx5: Fix the recovery flow of the UMR QP

> A race condition in the Linux kernel RDMA mlx5 driver can cause tasks to hang, leading to a denial of service.

- **Severity:** Medium 4.7 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/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:** 27 Mar 2025
- **Updated:** 21 Oct 2026
- **Also known as:** AZL-62678, BELL-CVE-2025-21892, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-21892, GHSA-x4h3-99vh-7946, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-21892, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2404-CVE-2025-21892, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-21892

## What is CVE-2025-21892?

CVE-2025-21892 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 27 Mar 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:

RDMA/mlx5: Fix the recovery flow of the UMR QP

This patch addresses an issue in the recovery flow of the UMR QP,
ensuring tasks do not get stuck, as highlighted by the call trace [1].

During recovery, before transitioning the QP to the RESET state, the
software must wait for all outstanding WRs to complete.

Failing to do so can cause the firmware to skip sending some flushed
CQEs with errors and simply discard them upon the RESET, as per the IB
specification.

This race condition can result in lost CQEs and tasks becoming stuck.

To resolve this, the patch sends a final WR which serves only as a
barrier before moving the QP state to RESET.

Once a CQE is received for that final WR, it guarantees that no
outstanding WRs remain, making it safe to transition the QP to RESET and
subsequently back to RTS, restoring proper functionality.

Note:
For the barrier WR, we simply reuse the failed and ready WR.
Since the QP is in an error state, it will only receive
IB_WC_WR_FLUSH_ERR. However, as it serves only as a barrier we don't
care about its status.

[1]
INFO: task rdma_resource_l:1922 blocked for more than 120 seconds.
Tainted: G        W          6.12.0-rc7+ #1626
"echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
task:rdma_resource_l state:D stack:0  pid:1922 tgid:1922  ppid:1369
     flags:0x00004004
Call Trace:
<TASK>
__schedule+0x420/0xd30
schedule+0x47/0x130
schedule_timeout+0x280/0x300
? mark_held_locks+0x48/0x80
? lockdep_hardirqs_on_prepare+0xe5/0x1a0
wait_for_completion+0x75/0x130
mlx5r_umr_post_send_wait+0x3c2/0x5b0 [mlx5_ib]
? __pfx_mlx5r_umr_done+0x10/0x10 [mlx5_ib]
mlx5r_umr_revoke_mr+0x93/0xc0 [mlx5_ib]
__mlx5_ib_dereg_mr+0x299/0x520 [mlx5_ib]
? _raw_spin_unlock_irq+0x24/0x40
? wait_for_completion+0xfe/0x130
? rdma_restrack_put+0x63/0xe0 [ib_core]
ib_dereg_mr_user+0x5f/0x120 [ib_core]
? lock_release+0xc6/0x280
destroy_hw_idr_uobject+0x1d/0x60 [ib_uverbs]
uverbs_destroy_uobject+0x58/0x1d0 [ib_uverbs]
uobj_destroy+0x3f/0x70 [ib_uverbs]
ib_uverbs_cmd_verbs+0x3e4/0xbb0 [ib_uverbs]
? __pfx_uverbs_destroy_def_handler+0x10/0x10 [ib_uverbs]
? __lock_acquire+0x64e/0x2080
? mark_held_locks+0x48/0x80
? find_held_lock+0x2d/0xa0
? lock_acquire+0xc1/0x2f0
? ib_uverbs_ioctl+0xcb/0x170 [ib_uverbs]
? __fget_files+0xc3/0x1b0
ib_uverbs_ioctl+0xe7/0x170 [ib_uverbs]
? ib_uverbs_ioctl+0xcb/0x170 [ib_uverbs]
__x64_sys_ioctl+0x1b0/0xa70
do_syscall_64+0x6b/0x140
entry_SYSCALL_64_after_hwframe+0x76/0x7e
RIP: 0033:0x7f99c918b17b
RSP: 002b:00007ffc766d0468 EFLAGS: 00000246 ORIG_RAX:
     0000000000000010
RAX: ffffffffffffffda RBX: 00007ffc766d0578 RCX:
     00007f99c918b17b
RDX: 00007ffc766d0560 RSI: 00000000c0181b01 RDI:
     0000000000000003
RBP: 00007ffc766d0540 R08: 00007f99c8f99010 R09:
     000000000000bd7e
R10: 00007f99c94c1c70 R11: 0000000000000246 R12:
     00007ffc766d0530
R13: 000000000000001c R14: 0000000040246a80 R15:
     0000000000000000
</TASK>

Weakness: CWE-362 (Concurrent Execution using Shared Resource with Improper Synchronization)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-21892?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2025-21892?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2025-21892 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-21892 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-2025-21892 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2025-21892 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 27 Mar 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-2025-21892 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-2025-21892/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-21892/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-21892
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-21892
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2025-21892

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-21892/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.
