CVE-2025-37743 wifi: ath12k: Avoid memory leak while enabling statistics
A memory leak in the ath12k WiFi driver can lead to resource exhaustion and denial of service when extended statistics mode is enabled.
- 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
What is CVE-2025-37743?
CVE-2025-37743 is a medium-severity denial of service 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:
wifi: ath12k: Avoid memory leak while enabling statistics
Driver uses monitor destination rings for extended statistics mode and standalone monitor mode. In extended statistics mode, TLVs are parsed from the buffer received from the monitor destination ring and assigned to the ppdu_info structure to update per-packet statistics. In standalone monitor mode, along with per-packet statistics, the packet data (payload) is captured, and the driver updates per MSDU to mac80211.
When the AP interface is enabled, only extended statistics mode is activated. As part of enabling monitor rings for collecting statistics, the driver subscribes to HAL_RX_MPDU_START TLV in the filter configuration. This TLV is received from the monitor destination ring, and kzalloc for the mon_mpdu object occurs, which is not freed, leading to a memory leak. The kzalloc for the mon_mpdu object is only required while enabling the standalone monitor interface. This causes a memory leak while enabling extended statistics mode in the driver.
Fix this memory leak by removing the kzalloc for the mon_mpdu object in the HAL_RX_MPDU_START TLV handling. Additionally, remove the standalone monitor mode handlings in the HAL_MON_BUF_ADDR and HAL_RX_MSDU_END TLVs. These TLV tags will be handled properly when enabling standalone monitor mode in the future.
Tested-on: QCN9274 hw2.0 PCI WLAN.WBE.1.3.1-00173-QCAHKSWPL_SILICONZ-1 Tested-on: WCN7850 hw2.0 PCI WLAN.HMT.1.0.c5-00481-QCAHMTSWPL_V1.0_V2.0_SILICONZ-3
Weakness: CWE-401
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-37743?
It affects 1 product.
Products include Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2025-37743?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.
Is CVE-2025-37743 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-37743 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Linux kernel
Sources
Also known as BELL-CVE-2025-37743, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-37743, GHSA-v99v-6wp3-34rf, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-13-CVE-2025-37743, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2204-CVE-2025-37743, ROOT-OS-UBUNTU-2404-CVE-2025-37743 and 1 more.