CVE-2025-38062 genirq/msi: Store the IOMMU IOVA directly in msi_desc instead of iommu_cookie
A race condition in Linux kernel MSI handling allows use-after-free, potentially enabling local privilege escalation or code execution.
- 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-2025-38062?
CVE-2025-38062 is a high-severity use after free vulnerability in Debian Debian Linux, published on 18 Jun 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:
genirq/msi: Store the IOMMU IOVA directly in msi_desc instead of iommu_cookie
The IOMMU translation for MSI message addresses has been a 2-step process, separated in time:
1) iommu_dma_prepare_msi(): A cookie pointer containing the IOVA address is stored in the MSI descriptor when an MSI interrupt is allocated.
2) iommu_dma_compose_msi_msg(): this cookie pointer is used to compute a translated message address.
This has an inherent lifetime problem for the pointer stored in the cookie that must remain valid between the two steps. However, there is no locking at the irq layer that helps protect the lifetime. Today, this works under the assumption that the iommu domain is not changed while MSI interrupts being programmed. This is true for normal DMA API users within the kernel, as the iommu domain is attached before the driver is probed and cannot be changed while a driver is attached.
Classic VFIO type1 also prevented changing the iommu domain while VFIO was running as it does not support changing the "container" after starting up.
However, iommufd has improved this so that the iommu domain can be changed during VFIO operation. This potentially allows userspace to directly race VFIO_DEVICE_ATTACH_IOMMUFD_PT (which calls iommu_attach_group()) and VFIO_DEVICE_SET_IRQS (which calls into iommu_dma_compose_msi_msg()).
This potentially causes both the cookie pointer and the unlocked call to iommu_get_domain_for_dev() on the MSI translation path to become UAFs.
Fix the MSI cookie UAF by removing the cookie pointer. The translated IOVA address is already known during iommu_dma_prepare_msi() and cannot change. Thus, it can simply be stored as an integer in the MSI descriptor.
The other UAF related to iommu_get_domain_for_dev() will be addressed in patch "iommu: Make iommu_dma_prepare_msi() into a generic operation" by using the IOMMU group mutex.
Which versions are affected by CVE-2025-38062?
It affects 2 products.
Products include Debian Debian Linux, Linux kernel.
How do I fix CVE-2025-38062?
Apply the vendor's patch.
Upgrade to the fixed version. These bugs are found with fuzzing and sanitisers and avoided by memory-safe languages. More about Use after free.
Is CVE-2025-38062 being exploited?
There is no known exploitation of CVE-2025-38062 in the wild and no public exploit code.
Other vulnerabilities in Debian Debian Linux
Sources
Also known as AZL-64058, AZL-72754, BELL-CVE-2025-38062, DEBIAN-CVE-2025-38062, GHSA-35hv-9h7x-xw9j, ROOT-OS-DEBIAN-11-CVE-2025-38062 and 4 more.