# CVE-2025-22053: net: ibmveth: make veth_pool_store stop hanging

> A race condition in the ibmveth driver allows local attackers to cause a system hang by concurrently writing to sysfs pool attributes.

- **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:** 16 Apr 2025
- **Updated:** 11 May 2026
- **Also known as:** BELL-CVE-2025-22053, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-22053, GHSA-59g4-mvcc-7p3x, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2025-22053, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-12-CVE-2025-22053, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2025-22053, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2404-CVE-2025-22053, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-22053

## What is CVE-2025-22053?

CVE-2025-22053 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 16 Apr 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:

net: ibmveth: make veth_pool_store stop hanging

v2:
- Created a single error handling unlock and exit in veth_pool_store
- Greatly expanded commit message with previous explanatory-only text

Summary: Use rtnl_mutex to synchronize veth_pool_store with itself,
ibmveth_close and ibmveth_open, preventing multiple calls in a row to
napi_disable.

Background: Two (or more) threads could call veth_pool_store through
writing to /sys/devices/vio/30000002/pool*/*. You can do this easily
with a little shell script. This causes a hang.

I configured LOCKDEP, compiled ibmveth.c with DEBUG, and built a new
kernel. I ran this test again and saw:

    Setting pool0/active to 0
    Setting pool1/active to 1
    [   73.911067][ T4365] ibmveth 30000002 eth0: close starting
    Setting pool1/active to 1
    Setting pool1/active to 0
    [   73.911367][ T4366] ibmveth 30000002 eth0: close starting
    [   73.916056][ T4365] ibmveth 30000002 eth0: close complete
    [   73.916064][ T4365] ibmveth 30000002 eth0: open starting
    [  110.808564][  T712] systemd-journald[712]: Sent WATCHDOG=1 notification.
    [  230.808495][  T712] systemd-journald[712]: Sent WATCHDOG=1 notification.
    [  243.683786][  T123] INFO: task stress.sh:4365 blocked for more than 122 seconds.
    [  243.683827][  T123]       Not tainted 6.14.0-01103-g2df0c02dab82-dirty #8
    [  243.683833][  T123] "echo 0 > /proc/sys/kernel/hung_task_timeout_secs" disables this message.
    [  243.683838][  T123] task:stress.sh       state:D stack:28096 pid:4365  tgid:4365  ppid:4364   task_flags:0x400040 flags:0x00042000
    [  243.683852][  T123] Call Trace:
    [  243.683857][  T123] [c00000000c38f690] [0000000000000001] 0x1 (unreliable)
    [  243.683868][  T123] [c00000000c38f840] [c00000000001f908] __switch_to+0x318/0x4e0
    [  243.683878][  T123] [c00000000c38f8a0] [c000000001549a70] __schedule+0x500/0x12a0
    [  243.683888][  T123] [c00000000c38f9a0] [c00000000154a878] schedule+0x68/0x210
    [  243.683896][  T123] [c00000000c38f9d0] [c00000000154ac80] schedule_preempt_disabled+0x30/0x50
    [  243.683904][  T123] [c00000000c38fa00] [c00000000154dbb0] __mutex_lock+0x730/0x10f0
    [  243.683913][  T123] [c00000000c38fb10] [c000000001154d40] napi_enable+0x30/0x60
    [  243.683921][  T123] [c00000000c38fb40] [c000000000f4ae94] ibmveth_open+0x68/0x5dc
    [  243.683928][  T123] [c00000000c38fbe0] [c000000000f4aa20] veth_pool_store+0x220/0x270
    [  243.683936][  T123] [c00000000c38fc70] [c000000000826278] sysfs_kf_write+0x68/0xb0
    [  243.683944][  T123] [c00000000c38fcb0] [c0000000008240b8] kernfs_fop_write_iter+0x198/0x2d0
    [  243.683951][  T123] [c00000000c38fd00] [c00000000071b9ac] vfs_write+0x34c/0x650
    [  243.683958][  T123] [c00000000c38fdc0] [c00000000071bea8] ksys_write+0x88/0x150
    [  243.683966][  T123] [c00000000c38fe10] [c0000000000317f4] system_call_exception+0x124/0x340
    [  243.683973][  T123] [c00000000c38fe50] [c00000000000d05c] system_call_vectored_common+0x15c/0x2ec
    ...
    [  243.684087][  T123] Showing all locks held in the system:
    [  243.684095][  T123] 1 lock held by khungtaskd/123:
    [  243.684099][  T123]  #0: c00000000278e370 (rcu_read_lock){....}-{1:2}, at: debug_show_all_locks+0x50/0x248
    [  243.684114][  T123] 4 locks held by stress.sh/4365:
    [  243.684119][  T123]  #0: c00000003a4cd3f8 (sb_writers#3){.+.+}-{0:0}, at: ksys_write+0x88/0x150
    [  243.684132][  T123]  #1: c000000041aea888 (&of->mutex#2){+.+.}-{3:3}, at: kernfs_fop_write_iter+0x154/0x2d0
    [  243.684143][  T123]  #2: c0000000366fb9a8 (kn->active#64){.+.+}-{0:0}, at: kernfs_fop_write_iter+0x160/0x2d0
    [  243.684155][  T123]  #3: c000000035ff4cb8 (&dev->lock){+.+.}-{3:3}, at: napi_enable+0x30/0x60
    [  243.684166][  T123] 5 locks held by stress.sh/4366:
    [  243.684170][  T123]  #0: c00000003a4cd3f8 (sb_writers#3){.+.+}-{0:0}, at: ksys_write+0x88/0x150
    [  243.
---truncated---

Weakness: CWE-667 (Improper Locking)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-22053?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2025-22053?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2025-22053 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-22053 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-2025-22053 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2025-22053 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 16 Apr 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-2025-22053 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-2025-22053/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-22053/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-22053
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-22053
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2025-22053

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-22053/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.
