# CVE-2025-23149: tpm: do not start chip while suspended

> A race condition in the Linux kernel TPM driver allows starting the chip while suspended, causing a kernel warning and potential system instability.

- **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:** 1 May 2025
- **Updated:** 23 May 2026
- **Also known as:** BELL-CVE-2025-23149, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-23149, GHSA-9qj7-j3p9-hf88, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2404-CVE-2025-23149, UBUNTU-CVE-2025-23149

## What is CVE-2025-23149?

CVE-2025-23149 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 1 May 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:

tpm: do not start chip while suspended

Checking TPM_CHIP_FLAG_SUSPENDED after the call to tpm_find_get_ops() can
lead to a spurious tpm_chip_start() call:

[35985.503771] i2c i2c-1: Transfer while suspended
[35985.503796] WARNING: CPU: 0 PID: 74 at drivers/i2c/i2c-core.h:56 __i2c_transfer+0xbe/0x810
[35985.503802] Modules linked in:
[35985.503808] CPU: 0 UID: 0 PID: 74 Comm: hwrng Tainted: G        W          6.13.0-next-20250203-00005-gfa0cb5642941 #19 9c3d7f78192f2d38e32010ac9c90fdc71109ef6f
[35985.503814] Tainted: [W]=WARN
[35985.503817] Hardware name: Google Morphius/Morphius, BIOS Google_Morphius.13434.858.0 10/26/2023
[35985.503819] RIP: 0010:__i2c_transfer+0xbe/0x810
[35985.503825] Code: 30 01 00 00 4c 89 f7 e8 40 fe d8 ff 48 8b 93 80 01 00 00 48 85 d2 75 03 49 8b 16 48 c7 c7 0a fb 7c a7 48 89 c6 e8 32 ad b0 fe <0f> 0b b8 94 ff ff ff e9 33 04 00 00 be 02 00 00 00 83 fd 02 0f 5
[35985.503828] RSP: 0018:ffffa106c0333d30 EFLAGS: 00010246
[35985.503833] RAX: 074ba64aa20f7000 RBX: ffff8aa4c1167120 RCX: 0000000000000000
[35985.503836] RDX: 0000000000000000 RSI: ffffffffa77ab0e4 RDI: 0000000000000001
[35985.503838] RBP: 0000000000000001 R08: 0000000000000001 R09: 0000000000000000
[35985.503841] R10: 0000000000000004 R11: 00000001000313d5 R12: ffff8aa4c10f1820
[35985.503843] R13: ffff8aa4c0e243c0 R14: ffff8aa4c1167250 R15: ffff8aa4c1167120
[35985.503846] FS:  0000000000000000(0000) GS:ffff8aa4eae00000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
[35985.503849] CS:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
[35985.503852] CR2: 00007fab0aaf1000 CR3: 0000000105328000 CR4: 00000000003506f0
[35985.503855] Call Trace:
[35985.503859]  <TASK>
[35985.503863]  ? __warn+0xd4/0x260
[35985.503868]  ? __i2c_transfer+0xbe/0x810
[35985.503874]  ? report_bug+0xf3/0x210
[35985.503882]  ? handle_bug+0x63/0xb0
[35985.503887]  ? exc_invalid_op+0x16/0x50
[35985.503892]  ? asm_exc_invalid_op+0x16/0x20
[35985.503904]  ? __i2c_transfer+0xbe/0x810
[35985.503913]  tpm_cr50_i2c_transfer_message+0x24/0xf0
[35985.503920]  tpm_cr50_i2c_read+0x8e/0x120
[35985.503928]  tpm_cr50_request_locality+0x75/0x170
[35985.503935]  tpm_chip_start+0x116/0x160
[35985.503942]  tpm_try_get_ops+0x57/0x90
[35985.503948]  tpm_find_get_ops+0x26/0xd0
[35985.503955]  tpm_get_random+0x2d/0x80

Don't move forward with tpm_chip_start() inside tpm_try_get_ops(), unless
TPM_CHIP_FLAG_SUSPENDED is not set. tpm_find_get_ops() will return NULL in
such a failure case.

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-23149?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Linux kernel.

## How do I fix CVE-2025-23149?

Apply the vendor's patch.

## Is CVE-2025-23149 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-23149 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-2025-23149 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2025-23149 is a medium-severity vulnerability in Linux kernel, published on 1 May 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-2025-23149 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-2025-23149/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-23149/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2025-23149
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2025-23149
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2025-23149

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2025-23149/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.
